💡Tip 1. Create Self-Fulfilling Prophecies Trough Mental Imagery.
First impressions are indelible. Why? Because in our fast-paced world we must form quick judgments to makesense of the world. Everybody you meet makes a subconscious judgment on whether they want you in their lives. The first 10 seconds of your reactions set the stage upon which the entire relationship will be played out. Listen to this to learn 5 useful techniques to make a great first impression.
💡Tip 2. Be Empathic Trough Non-Verbal Communication.
Do conversations end when people want them to? Follow this thread to learn what our latest two studies of 932 conversations found out.
We asked participants when they wanted a conversation to end & to estimate when their partner (intimate in Study 1 & stranger in Study 2) had wanted it to end.
- Conversations almost never ended when both conversants wanted them to & rarely ended when even one conversant wanted them to.
- Average discrepancy between desired & actual durations was roughly half the #duration of the conversation.
- Conversants had little idea when their partners wanted to end & underestimated how discrepant their partners’ desires were from their own.
91.19% of participants whose x-axis values were ≤1.
94.05% of participants whose x-axis values were ≤1.91.
These studies suggest that ending conversations is a classic “coordination problem” that humans are unable to solve because doing so requires information that they normally keep from each other. As a result, most conversations appear to end when no one wants them to.
💡Tip Reshape A Conversation By Asking A Question.
How to Control a Conversation Without Saying Much at All? What can we do when one speaker is monopolizing a discussion? Follow this thread to learn a useful tactic called #cognitiveIncision.
Cognitive incision is a way to reshape a conversation simply by asking a question. Not just any question, though. A question that cuts through. Think of the word “incision” itself — in surgery, it means to cut into something, usually flesh. It is precise, clean, and effective.
To use cognitive incision, you must listen closely to the speaker, track their statements, and predict where they are going. The sharpness of your question is absolutely crucial. It cannot be simplistic, easily dismissed, or nominal. It should be relevant and well-timed. Maybe humorous. It should go off like a curiosity detonator in people’s minds
The Downton Abbey character Dowager Countess, who uses well-timed wit and punchy questions to bring a halt to opinions she finds irrelevant. Once, when the family dined around the dinner table, her son Matthew Crawley announced he was getting a job. To the Dowager, the notion of a job was a foreign “middle-class” concept, inappropriate for aristocracy, so when Matthew mentions that he will be available on weekends, the Dowager inserts a cleverly disguised cognitive incision, “What is a ‘week-end’?” to reset the conversation.