Where You Sit in Lecture: What It Says About You

The place you choose to sit in lecture can sometimes make or break your experience and attention span for that class. So how do you know if where you are sitting is helping or hurting you, or even sending the professor the wrong message about you as a student? Here is a list that tells you what your chair selection says about you.

The First Row

If you’ve chosen to sit just a few feet from the professor, you’re either a nerd who is first to raise your hand to answer a question (even the rhetorical ones), or a pseudo-nerd.

And by pseudo-nerd I mean you’re one of those students who was told by his or her parents that first-row students are more frequently noticed and appreciated by their professors. So, you’ve decided to commit to the whole front-and-center act to come across as eager and studious when in reality you want nothing more than to hang back and scroll through your Instagram feed. Basically, you’re faking it ‘til you make it.

Middle-front

This one can be a little tricky. If you’re a middle-fronter, you’re either one of two things:

1. A motivated, but laid-back individual. You know it’s important to focus in class—sitting in the back isn’t going to cut it—but, front-and-center really isn’t your style. When it comes down to it, you’re a low-key nerd.

2. You’re a last minute person—you never arrive to class in time to pick the seat you actually want, so you’re always stuck with the rejected middle-front seats that never seem to be filled up (I wonder why…). You immediately regret your lateness every time you have to deal with the slim pickings, yet you never change your ways.

Aisle seat

Aisle-seaters are also hard to pinpoint. Some genuinely have nowhere else to sit—they get to class a little late and don’t want to displace an entire row of people just to be able to make it to the center.

Then there are the aisle-seaters who get to class early and deliberately occupy the outermost seat in an otherwise empty row. These are the students who either overly value their personal space or they’re ready to gun it the second the bell rings.

Either way, these deliberate aisle-seaters make everyone else squeeze by them in order to sit anywhere remotely near them in a given row—and for that, they suck.

Way back

Way-backers are sometimes late arrivals who have no choice other than to discretely duck into the last section of the lecture hall (regardless of whether or not they prefer sitting closer). But, more often than not, way-backers prefer the anonymity and minimal effort their lack of proximity allots them. They’re able to go on their phones and pretend multi-tasking is actually effective.

They can also rest assured knowing they’ll never be called on (or literally expected to do anything).

But, there’s a little more to this than merely front, middle, back. Whether you sit on the left or right also reveals something about you as a student.

If you’re generally drawn to sitting on the left side of the lecture hall, you might be left-brain dominant—governed by active learning, such as note-taking, and motivated by participation. Those who are right-brain dominant, on the other hand, tend to sit on the right side of a classroom. They generally prefer passive learning—listening and processing information rather than actively engaging in it. That being said, since open seating can be limited, we don’t always end up where we’d prefer to sit (but when we’re in our ideal spot, we know).

Even more, there are free-floaters—those who sit in a different seat every time, merely based on availability, and are indifferent to the variations.

Lastly, there are those who habitually return to the same spot. These people value familiarity and routine.

Next time you’re deciding where to sit in a lecture hall, pause to take note of where you’re drawn—horizontally and vertically—in the sea of chairs, and do a little self-reflecting.

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