Some people can be very friendly. Very, very uncomfortably friendly.
It isn't just that they tend to stand too close when they're talking to people — it's that they're practically on them. You may even be complete strangers, but that doesn't stop them from hanging off of you and breathing your CO2 during the conversation, whether you like it or not. It doesn't help that they tend to get... er, grabby.
Somebody with No Sense of Personal Space may keep their targets of uncomfortable closeness down to one person, or they might be like this with everyone. The character might be a Cloudcuckoolander that just doesn't know better, or they may just really, really like you (or everyone), and just don't let some bothersome "social etiquette" get in the way of it. Then again, they just might be trying to get you riled up for shits and giggles. This tendency usually comes with inappropriate uses of First Name Basis.
Anime characters with No Sense of Personal Space love to implement The Glomp as their favored tactic. For best results, have them latch onto someone that Hates Being Touched. It can also a be good source of Ho Yay, Foe Yay, or Les Yay. Compare Cuddle Bug.
Not to be confused with the Personal Space Invader, which deals with grabby Mooks in video games.
Kon to just about every big-breasted and/or good-looking female. However, Rukia is a favorite target, too, although she usually stomps on him before he can try anything.
And Chizuru towards any good-looking girl, most notably towards Orihime and Rukia.
Also Aizen. So much so that fandom has come to peg him as a Depraved BisexualMemetic Molester, since he seems to like being touchy-feely with "victims" of both genders. Hugging Momo and speaking to her sweetly before stabbing her to almost death? Check. Caressing Orihime's face as he Lecturizes her and then lets her go? Double check. Almost feeling up Ichigo when they're finally face to face, even placing his hand on the kid's chest? Triple check.
Rangiku likes draping her arms over people, leaning her face closer to someone elses', tickling people while she's in the nude and so forth, but mostly when she wants to party or bring levity to a serious moment. On the other hand, Haineko gets like this around both boys and girls that seem to interest her.
Shinnosuke from Ultra Maniac. Although its understandable since the only episode he's in has him change from a cat into a human.
Shampoo. When Ranma's involved, the word "personal space" does not exist!
Kodachi Kunō to her "darling" Ranma.
She must have gotten it from her brother, Tatewaki.
Happōsai, being the patron saint of Dirty Old Men, literally lives to latch onto women so he can feel their breasts and buttocks.
Ranma himself, while he Hates Being Touched, has no qualms about perching on other people's heads to say hello. And whenever Female!Ranma is in disguise to fool Ryōga, she tends to be quite the grabby girl.
Fred Lou tends to get really touchy with Gene, mostly because he's completely hot for him. Gene usually handles it with good humor, but sometimes Fred likes to pull little "jokes" like suggestively blowing into his ear during business exchanges.
Italy, being The Ditz and slightly Truth in Television about real life Italians, just doesn't understand that his need for constant close human contact makes Germany and Japan more than merely uncomfortable (especially since he combines his habit of sneaking to sleep into other peoples' beds with the habit of sleeping naked). Lampshaded in the Valentine's Day Strips when Germany, unable to distinguish if Italy's actions are a veiled way of expressing romantic feelings or just his own idiosyncrasy, consults Austria to clear his mind up.
Germany: Hey Austria, what type of relationship do you call it when you see them everyday, and they hug and kiss you, and go in the bath with you, and sleep in the same bed with you (while they're naked)? Austria:(blushing) ...Don't say such vulgar things! Germany:(despaired) Vulgar....?! Austria: Oh, you meant him...
Also, France has a tendency to get close to people and attempt to grope them. Let's not forget the Olympics.
Son Goku started off like this back in early Dragon Ball, when he figured that the easiest way to tell a boy from a girl was to feel for their... well, parts. He learns his lesson after ChiChi reacts a little more physically than most and throws him off the Kinto'un/Nimbus at about 50 mph.
Big Badass Cornelia tends to be rather touchy feely with her younger sister Euphemia.
Milly can be a little too touchy feely around Shirley at times.
Shader from Chrono Crusade just loves getting touchy with pretty much everyone and everything. She does not care if your are friend, stranger, sworn enemy, male, female, human, or demon (though she does have an extra fondness for youngchildren...) — she will want to hug you. No exceptions.
Hitagi Senjogahara from Bakemonogatari. She spends a lot of her conversations with Koyomi invading his personal space bubble in spectacular ways. And feels him up while they're in the car with her father.
And Tsukuyomi mainly does this around Setsuna and various other girls.
Arthur of Air Gear was like this to his opponent Agito, even pelvic thrusting against him and nibbling his ear. And Shalott ended up straddling Agito at the end of one chapter.
Undertaker to Ciel and sometimes Sebastian to Ciel.
Kaoru towards to Junichi in Amagami SS whether she's the love interest or not. Even more so at her arc than the others.
In Pokémon Special, N has no problem whispering into the ear of another boy before said boy is even aware of him. N later grabs him by the arm and brings him up close. It's kind of creepy considering N's almost dead expression. Gender obviously isn't an issue for N, as he gets up close and personal with White in the Nimbasa ferris wheel.
Kirika in Eiken clearly doesn't believe in personnel boudarys when it comes to Densuke.
In Wild Fangs, Syon is like this towards Mao before they actually get together.
In ...Junai No Seinen, Ian uses the fact he is known for this as an excuse to grope Kaoru in public.
Nathan from Tiger & Bunny is like this when he's around his male coworkers — with varying reactions from the targets. (Barnaby gets annoyed and shoves him away, Antonio just wishes he'd keep his hands above the belt, Kotetsu doesn't really care as long as he's not effectively trying to occupy the same space as him◊.)
Akio of Revolutionary Girl Utena is like this around anyone he tries to seduce. Touga is like this around Utena, Wakaba to Utena, Kozue to Miki, Saionji to Anthy, and Nanami to Touga.
In Boku Wa Tomodachi Ga Sukunai, Sena sometimes does this to Kodaka when talking about games. When done in Yozora's presence, she tends to get a bit jealous and smacks Sena with a fly swatter if Kodaka doesn't make her back up first.
Sena also has a tendency to do this to Kodaka's younger sister, Kobato, due to Cuteness Proximity. It always creeps Kobato out, and she will either hide behind Kodaka, or run away if the situation allows.
Natsu from Fairy Tail has shades of this, particularly when it involves Lucy. He will occasionally get up right next to people or even come out of nowhere and grab them. He's also crawled into Lucy's bed a few times or casually walked in on her at moments that even he couldn't have realized were inopportune with perfectly innocent intentions.
Tomoe from Kamisama Kiss is like this much to Nanami's chagrin. However, he stops temporarily once he learns that she loves him only to fall back into the habit again.
Comic Books
Albedo Erma Felna EDF has this trope of how Erma and her later best friend, Toki, first interacted. When Erma first bunked with Toki, that mouse had some bad habits like leaving the bathroom messy and barging in for frivolous reasons when Erma was using it. However, the last straw is when Toki's feline lover visits that night for sex and Erma is kept awake first with the thumping on the above bunk and the smell of the aftermath. Eventually, the two work out their differences.
Dogbert discusses cultural concepts of personal space in Dogbert's Clues for the Clueless. In America, you're allowed just inside the "Bad Breath Zone". In Italy, you can get inside the other person's clothes. In Australia, any distance is too damn close.
The twins very much fall under this category, seeing as their first order of business following their appearance was to start messing with the main character's easy access portal to his internal organs. Well, sackcloth-doll organs. Still, nobody wants a pair of busybodies monkeying around with their insides.
Treasure Planet: BEN. "I just wanna hug ya and squeeze ya and hold ya close to me!" Much to the dismay of Jim Hawkins.
Jim: You have to stop touching me.
Colette from Ratatouille thinks the only reason Linguini's personal space exists is so that she can invade it. Sure she was doing it to intimidate him but one can't help but think she does it for enjoyment with the way she repeatedly does it.
The eponymous character in Tarzan, as a result of being raised with no human contact.
Professor Porter: Oh, Janie Jane! What an amazing discovery! A man with no language, no human behavior...
Jane Porter: And no respect for personal boundaries.
Professor Porter: How do you mean?
Jane Porter: [gets extremely close to Professor Porter] He was this close to me, daddy, just staring at me!
Films — Live-Action
Beldar and other Remulaks in Coneheads often exhibits behavior like this, being aliens.
David from The Watcher just loves to find any excuse he can to hug and touch Joel.
Beetlejuice: Betelgeuse does this with anyone — living or dead.
Borat takes this to an extreme, even sprinting after people to get in their faces.
In Pirates of the Caribbean there doesn't seem to be any place more comfy and hospitable for pirates to hang out than your territorial bubble, and no pirate likes it better than Captain Jack. In the third film, Jack actually manages to invade his own personal space.
One of the aspects in the 2003 adaptation of Peter Pan, that really creeped out some reviewers, was Hook's complete lack of personal space with both Peter◊ and Wendy◊. The fact that he's an adult obsessed with killing a child (later multiple children) did not help. Jason Isaacs has described that in interviews as having being incredibly uncomfortable to portray.
Voldemort. When he steals the Elder Wand in Deathly Hallows Part 1, he's face to face with the dead Dumbledore. They'd be touching noses, if he had a nose. Part 2 didn't let up — after Harry's Disney Death, he offers the Hogwarts students and defenders a chance to join the ranks of the Death Eaters. Draco crosses the field to get to his parents, and Voldemort hugs him. Or tries to, anyway; he clearly has no idea what he's doing.
Several Death Eaters have this problem in the films; Snape gets uncomfortably close to Harry at times and both Scabior and Bellatrix have some rather suggestive moments with Hermione in Deathly Hallows Part 1.
As in the TV series, Littlefinger, Catelyn Stark's Unlucky Childhood Friend from A Song of Ice and Fire towards Catelyn's daughter Sansa. It's to an even greater degree than his television counterpart, where he leans in really close whenever he talks to her. In the books, he's literally stroking her face and playing with her hair on first meeting her. It just gets worse from there...
Christine Rhoades from Spectral Shadows can be this sometimes...like when she pounces the shy, geeky squirrel girl Kacey. Given that Kacey has a lot of her squirrel traits intact, so this doesn't go over well.
Live-Action TV
In Smallville, Clark sometimes accuse Chloe of this, although he is usually okay with it. There was this time she asked "since when we had boundaries?" and Clark looks uncomfortable, though.
The Eighth randomly kisses his companions when he's excited, both in the TV movie and in the novels. In the movie, he also repeatedly gets very close to Grace for no good reason, and she's visibly bothered by it.
The Ninth is significantly more distant than most Doctors, but still once said, "I'll hug anyone, me."
David Tennant combines this with No Indoor Voice frequently, just in case he hasn't completely overloaded your sense of personal space. He loves humans so damn much that he once asked to hug one that he'd met only seconds before, simply to celebrate humanity. And it may have had something to do with Tennant's close off-screen friendship with Billie Piper, but by the end of the second season of the New Series the Doctor and Rose were basically a single entity.
The Eleventh Doctor manages to have even less sense of personal space than the Tenth. He never stops touching someone. Though he does ask for Rory's permission each time he wants to give Amy a Security Cling. Then he snogs Rory in "Dinosaurs On A Spaceship", just because he's in a good mood. River Song, who has even less sense of personal space, manages to weaponise this: in the middle of a rather epic struggle, they get all up in each other's faces and give each other a quick Take That Kiss. With poison lipstick. He very nearly dies.
The Master towards the Doctor, constantly. And vice versa, a lot of the time; both Three and Ten got grabby with the Master.
Gene, with Sam, in Life on Mars. Constantly. Not that Sam ever really seemed to mind.
Castiel. From his first appearance, he has been constantly stepping into Dean's personal space. While staring very intensely into his eyes. Much Ho Yay ensues. Lampshaded in "Free to Be You and Me":
Dean: Cas, we've talked about this. Personal space. Castiel:(backing off like three inches) My apologies.
Also, Azazel (a.k.a. Yellow-eyes) in "In the Beginning" when Dean goes back in time. Apparently, they threw it in after the actor got uncomfortably close and smelled Dean. Jensen Ackles was appropriately freaked out.
Don't forget the Cupid with its naked hugging of complete strangers. AWKWARD.
Janeway of Star Trek: Voyager is also rather touchy-feely with her crew — hugging them, hand on the shoulder, etc. — although this is more likely an extension of her role as Team Mom than anything else. This was also one of the many ways in which Seven of Nine had no sense of social etiquette after being raised by the Borg.
Mulder from The X-Files with Scully. From day one, if they're in the same room, Scully has no personal space. He's also very touchy-feely with her. Scully is (understandably) quite perterbed by this during the first couple of seasons, but she gets used to it. Eventually, this constant lack of personal space becomes an integral part of their UST.
Damon, from The Vampire Diaries. He pretty much always does it deliberately to unnerve people, though.
Chandler does this to Joey when fighting over a chair.
Chandler:(with his hand inches from Joey's face) Not touching! Can't get mad!
All of the Friends tend to rub or pat each other just before a scene cut, usually if a joke was just directed at them.
It's also notable that, in the first four seasons, if any two of the friends are going to end up draped over each other on a sofa or snuggled in a comfy chair together, even in background shots, it was almost always Chandler and Monica. And this was before the writers started giving them a romance storyline... which might explain why they could get away with openly snuggling on a sofa together during the secret phase of their relationship without their friends cottoning on to the romance: it was completely normal behaviour for them.
Ziva does this to men quite frequently, mainly the men on her team. Sometimes you can even see them start to breathe faster and flush a bit....
Of course, Abby beats them all. The other two have mastered this for intimidation/seduction/both, but Abby is like this all the time. Mostly because she is just a happy, expressive person.
Dan: I even miss Chuck Bass, who would get so close to talk.
When they were doing the casting for Bones, it was noted that at one point during the auditions, David Boreanaz (playing FBI Special Agent Seeley Booth) stepped in close to Emily Deschanel. Where most people would have stepped back in response, she instead stood her ground.
Snafu Shelton in The Pacific, especially regarding Sledge.
Dr. Cal Lightman of Lie to Me does this all the time. He sprawls all over the place, gets in suspects' faces for shits and giggles, and seems to be incapable of staying out of Gillian Foster's personal space even when they're walking together. She either playfully elbows him out of it or otherwise doesn't seem to mind. In the season 3 episode, "Funhouse", Dr. Lightman gets himself admitted to a mental health facility (for the purposes of helping a patient there) and seems to dial this behavior up to eleven (either thanks to his own psychological oddities or in-part because of hallucinogenic drugs; it's left ambiguous even near the end/conclusion of the episode). Cal gets right up in the main man-behind-the-curtain's face, quite literally palming the guy's face like a blind man as Lightman himself talks, and even hanging off of Foster and his other colleagues when they come to help.
Space invader extraordinaire Malcom Tucker. Whether it's engaging in conspiratorial conversations in the narrow corridors of power (or the gent's lavatories), using intimidation to get what he wants or simply flirting with his colleagues, the "Thin White Mugabe" gets in close. Cornering seems to be the favoured tactic.
A similar example is Malcolm's Bastard Understudy Jamie, who gets just as close (sometimes manhandling people) and is even more likely to shout obscenities right in your face.
A very different example is Malcolm's nemesis Steve Fleming. Like Malcolm, Fleming gets much too close to people and has no aversion to touching them. Unlike Malcolm, Fleming is actually trying to be friendly, but fails miserably and comes across as a creepy slimy perv (especially with Niccola).
In The Sarah Connor Chronicles, Cameron tends to stand way too close to some people (likely to make it easier to kill them if she needs to) and also tends to stare for prolonged periods when she's considering the threat someone else represents to her or John Connor.
Littlefinger on Game Of Thrones seems perfectly capable of respecting everyone's space... except when it comes to Sansa, the teenage daughter of his childhood crush. Virtually every time he talks to her, he's either leaning in really close, touching her somehow, or both.
Impractical Jokers includes this in challenges often enough, but one of them, Joe, was known even before the show for "nosing" people (putting his nose on them without them noticing).
A huge reason why Sylar is so effectively creepy on Heroes is that he likes to get deliberately and uncomfortably close to whoever he's talking to. Claire is thoroughly disgusted as he sniffs her hair.
Video Games
Half-Life 2: Freeman's squad habitually crowd around him so closely that it can be impossible to move without bumping into one or take a shot without dinging one by accident. One imagines Gordon got to know who used which toothpaste, they're that close — as noted in this parody comic.
In Fallout 3, it is not uncommon for you to turn around to find one of your followers right up in your face. Also, robot butler Wadsworth tends to follow you around your Megaton home and do this.
Thanks to a certain moment near the end of the game, Tsaubern from Suikoden Tierkreis is often portrayed having this trait by the fandom.
In Divinity 2: Ego Draconis you have the summonable necromantic creature, which follows you everywhere and tend to get in the way or into your personal space more often than its combat benefits are worth. It also has an idling emote consisting of it raising a leg and urinating on the floor, which must come as very embarrassing for the hero if you're in someone's house. Why does an undead creature need to piss?
Parley. Mostly she does it to Andrew Smith (making it clear to everyone — except Andrew himself — that she has the hots for him) but she also gives Antimony some finger-poking action here, where The Rantlampshades her failure to respect personal space. This eventually gave Parley a scare of her life, though — touching Antimony at the wrong time led to an intimate mind-to-mind contact with one angry ghost.
Coyote likes to get up close and personal as well.
Petria from The Phoenix Requiem likes to do this to Jonas, mostly because of the reactions it gets from him. Her own lack of inhibition is due to the fact that she used to be a prostitute.
On occasion, Dora from Questionable Content. For example. She doesn't do it all the time, or to everyone; Faye gets it the most.
Taisei from Sakana. The awkwardness level of it is especially high because he's so tall. For added hilarity, he often get's paired with Yuudai.
In the first chapter of The Meek, we are introduced to Innocent Fanservice Girl Angora, who has lived in the wild for much of her life and consequently has not developed many cultural taboos, such as a sense of personal space. Pinter gets to discover this firsthand.
Cronus from Homestuck is a creepy version, touching people a lot to hit on them and insisting that it's just friendly and that they shouldn't make this weirder than it needs to be. When he does it to Mituna, who a) Hates Being Touched and b) is quite literally brain-damaged (which is not played for laughs), it's even worse than usual.
Starfire is ALWAYS eager to initiate "The Group Hug". Or an overly enthusiastic individual hug. Unfortunately, few people are willing to reciprocate, perhaps fearing broken ribs and bruising. The fact that she can learn any language by kissing is an unfortunate coincidence that does not help.
Jazz already had a problem invading into everyone's own personal privacy (due to being a psychologist-in-training), but when she becomes part of "Team Phantom", she takes it to epic levels. Danny is none-too-pleased. She later learns to keep a lower profile.
Vlad is also like this around Danny. Comes with his obsession of wanting to make Danny his son. And there's also whenever he gets his chance to spend time with Maddie...
Olga, Helga's older sister, is a bit too huggy around her younger sister, much to Helga's annoyance.
Another episode has Lulu, who is a different version of Lila, do such things to newcomer Arnold like rubbing his leg with her own, pretending to fall asleep on him, forcing a kiss on him, and suggest a late-night swim together. Arnold is noticeably unhappy with all this.
It is also a Running Gag for Brainy to announce his presence by standing so close to Helga that she can hear him breathing. She often responds by punching him in the face. Another instance has him randomly lay his head in her lap.
Sierra of Total Drama World Tour. Although it's usually Cody that has to deal with this, she's managed to creep out Heather, Noah and Chris by it too.
Fanboy and Chum Chum invoke this on each other all the time, so it's not all that noticeable. However, when they get this way with Kyle, his displeased expression is usually enough to see this trope occuring.
Discord has a tendency to get touchy-feely with others. Especially Twilight Sparkle, for some reason.
This is very likely another allusion to Q, who, as mentioned above, enjoyed invading personal space to the point of appearing in bed with Picard.
QueenChrysalis demonstrates a similar tendency, directed at the magically hypnotized Shining Armor, when giving her evil monologue. The fact that she's essentially a G-rated succubus might have something to do with it.
Pinkie Pie often gets this way when she's excited (especially around Rainbow Dash), and in the episode "Bridle Gossip," she admits to never having heard of personal space, to absolutely no one's surprise.
Rarity has her excitement-driven moments as well, most notably in "Ticket Master" when trying to convince Twilight to give her the extra ticket to the Gala.
Rarity: We are (rubs her face against Twilight's) the best of friends, are we not?
The Cutie Mark Crusaders in "One Bad Apple". Enthusiastic to meet Babs Seed, the trio rushes to greet her as soon as she steps off the train. The camera moves to Babs's point-of-view as Apple Bloom introduces herself and her friends while standing much too close. Then pans to Sweetie Belle, who's standing much closer, and finally to Scootaloo, who's standing even closer.
The upper part of Scootaloo's face takes up about 90% of the frame in the last shot.
Later, at the Crusaders' clubhouse, there's a moment where Scootaloo actually rubs her flank against Babs's, with the latter looking noticeably uncomfortable.
Real Life
Dogs.
Cats even more so, but that's mainly because they like being warm.
"The Johnson Treatment". US President Lyndon B. Johnson was well known for his domineering personality, part of which involved getting "his face a scant millimeter from his target".
There are three major ways in which people absorb information: Visual (through sight), Auditory (through sound) and Kinesthetic (through touch). Most people are dominant in one or two of these. Guess which one has issues with other people's personal space?
Some people with social disorders, such as autism, have trouble reading social cues, which may or may not involve an understanding of the concept of personal space.
Americans have one of the biggest bubbles of personal space in the world, leading to awkward situations when dealing with people of cultures who normally reserve much less. The biggest clash tends to occur in Asian countries, namely China, India, and Japan, who have such a high population density, there simply isn't enough room for personal space. On the other hand Asian cultures tend to have averse attitude towards touching between strangers, and many find the American custom of shaking hands at first meeting uncomfortable. Many Northern-Europeans also find Americans a bit too eager to act in manner reserved to close friends in their countries with casual acquaintances. If shaking hands is uncomfortable, imagine the reaction towards many South-European, south american and Middle-Eastern cultures in which people commonly greet each other by kissing on the cheeks. Some countries do a combination of these. In South Africa, people shake hands yet find kissing cheeks of any one other than a woman, child or sibling weird.
Older relatives you haven't seen for a while. They remember seeing you as a baby (which you obviously don't remember, so they might as well be a total stranger,) so they have no problem invading your space to hug you, pat your head, or pinch your cheeks. The fear of that cheek pinching has almost become a trope in itself.
Most toddlers and young children don't understand the concept of personal space yet.
People from big, crowded cities, like New York City or Tokyo, don't have much sense of personal space in comparison to those from the country or suburbs.
