You’re So Good At Conversation!

26:29But you can also analyze conversations in groups. It's just sort of a different beast. But in conversations with more than two people at that transition relevance place where it's probably someone else's turn to talk. Like if you're a group of people at a dinner party and you're telling a story, it's very common to like finish up the story and not just stare blankly into space. But you finish up the story and maybe look at one particular person. And there may be a reason for that. Maybe it's your person or maybe it's the person you originally sort of started the story in reference to what this other person was saying.

27:03So you'll kind of turn it back to them. But, you know, that's one way you can sort of indicate like, hey, now I'm looking at you. And they may not speak at that point. It may, you know, someone else may jump in. It just sort of depends. Right. You could also make a finger gun and go at that person. And they'll take over. One of the things I laughed a minute ago when you talked about staring blankly at the ceiling, it's so silly when you just take out like a proper response and put in something else. It just makes me laugh every time because it's so prescribed. Like these scripts are so prescribed that doing anything other than that is just absurd and hilarious.

27:44Yeah. I mean, it's like hidden camera material, you know. So I mentioned that I think I corrected myself. Actually, it's considered an interruption. When I misspoke and said breath weirdly and then said it again correctly right after, I actually interrupted myself. And I referred to that as a repair mechanism. That's exactly what it is. Because one of the unsung parts of human interaction and conversation is that we have to have ways of correcting and adjusting misunderstandings. If we didn't, we would be able to converse, but two people would walk away from the conversation potentially with totally different understandings of the information that was just exchanged, right?

28:30So we have to be able to correct ourselves when we know we made a mistake. And then also, conversely, we need to be able to ask for clarification if we didn't understand what the person was saying. Yeah, or someone else may ask for that clarification or something like that. So the repair doesn't have to come. It's not necessarily a self-repair always. Right. But it doesn't mean like going to the person and being like, I'm really sorry and I'm not going to do this anymore. And here's how we're going to do it better from this point forward. Not that kind of repair. There are also gaps. something to identify when they're analyzing conversations.

29:04And we all know what that is. I believe I always call them and friends have called them awkward pauses when it's not clear who the next speaker is going to be. And that can happen. Like, you know, you can, and even with groups of close friends in a very social situation. In fact, I feel like that's when it's most sort of noticeable is when like you're at a dinner party and something and everyone's laughing and saying things and then everyone just draws a blank for a couple of beats. Sure. And then someone will usually say, like, awkward pause or something like that and not say, like, that's a technically it's a conversation gap.

29:39That's, I think, a good replacement now because awkward pause is so used up. Just be like conversation gap. So it can be uncomfortable when it happens naturally like that. Like everybody's just kind of run out of things to say about whatever that conversation was. it's even more uncomfortable when somebody misses their turn to speak. Right. Like clearly. Yes. Or they don't give any sort of response. Right. That is that can cause a gap. And a lot of times you can signal that by like repeating the question you just asked, saying the the punchline one more time, saying something like, what do you what do you think about that?

30:23A prompting thing. And then there's also nonverbal ways of signaling gaps, like putting both hands in the air and going into a forward lunge. Right. I've always found that if the joke doesn't go over, just merely repeating the punchline again always works. Exactly. Over and over and over again. You may not have heard me. Right. Adjacency pairs. I think you might have mentioned that, but that's when a specific kind of response is expected. So like, how's it going? Hey, I'm doing pretty good. They're also a lot of times referred to as pre-sequences. So just sort of like it's sort of like a pat answer almost.

31:02Yeah. Like, come in, won't you? Thank you. That'd be invitation, acceptance, greeting, greeting, question, answer. There's actually a lot of those that those are the ones that are maybe even silliest when you replace it. Like if somebody says, would you like a slice of cake? And you go, hello. Right. It doesn't work. Well, what if you went, hello? Exactly. I was going to say the same thing. Like, we've figured out ways around that you can massage the rules and get even more creative with the whole thing. That you could use something that's totally inappropriate and make it appropriate. The best thing about something that funny is explaining it to death.

31:42All right, here, ask me for cake one more time. I got one more. Okay. Would you like a slice of cake? Go f*** yourself. that works it kind of works to an extent for sure uh stories is another one when you mention the staring into space uh at the end of like a question to you that can also happen at the end of a story if you don't know what you're doing as a as a communicator um when you start a story you a lot of time give an indicator that you know that it's going to be you for a minute or two uh by saying something like did I ever tell you about or something like that or get a Get a load of this.

32:19Yeah, get a load of this. Or I tell you what happened to me. And then you start your sort of story. And usually you will end it by kind of looking in someone's direction. And that's when you should sort of acknowledge by either saying like, oh, man, that's so funny or just something like that and not just stare blankly back at somebody. So I have I'm guilty of doing that, especially before I started treating my ADHD. My mind would wander very easily when somebody was telling a story. And I would know that I really miffed it when the person would look at me and then have to feel like they had to explain why I should be reacting more than I am.

32:55And then I'd be like, oh, yeah, that really sucks that that happened to you. It was not it doesn't really make for good interactions, really. People want to stay away from you. Oh, Josh really dug that one, huh? Right. Huh? What? Because, yeah, you don't say, huh, what? I wasn't paying attention. and you try to play it off and that actually makes it worse. Yeah. There are discourse markers and they're just sort of words or phrases like organizationally help out, like oh or because. And you're usually like connecting something to something that came before it. Right. And then the last one is a laminated action, which is when you combine it with a gesture that it doesn't just change the meaning, it actually completes the meaning.

33:42Yeah. Livia gave an example of when you say, oh, yeah, I've met him and you roll your eyes, right? If you just say, oh, yeah, I've met him. Even that same intonation, it doesn't tell the person what you actually think about them. You roll your eyes, then they get the whole picture. You've met them. You've judged them. You can't stand them. You wish they were dead, dead, dead. Yeah. Good eye roll can say all those things. Exactly. Should we take another break now or keep going? Let's talk about overlap maybe and then we can take a break. That feels about right. Good idea. So overlap is a really, really, like I feel like conversation analysts just sort of light up whenever there's an overlap that they can witness.

34:29They get pretty turned on by that kind of thing. One common form is just like just a simple misunderstanding. Like I didn't know that your turn was over. I'm sorry. Uh, it's not the same thing as interruption. Uh, those are two different things, but, um, interruption is like when you stop in the middle of like stop somebody in the middle of their sentence and talk over them and overlap is just when someone stops talking and had something else to say maybe. And you, you start on your own train. Yeah. That's the thing I think I do the most to you. I think you're done. And then I keep talking or I start talking.

35:04Um, that is, uh, yeah, That's just straight up interruption. Unintentional. There is such a thing as intentional interruption where somebody is trying to like gain control or dominate a conversation. Yeah. AKA total jerks. Right. There's also a different kind of interruption, which is a cooperative interruption. Like when I say right to you while you're telling a story, I'm actually interjecting it while you're still using your turn. You're making a turn construction unit. Uh-huh. Unit. but I'm helping you along at the very least demonstrating I'm listening and participating in the conversation which makes it cooperative.

35:44Yeah, and those are just fine. You can interrupt people all the time in the middle of their story and even add to it if you're, if you can, like maybe you'll interrupt and say like somebody was telling a story about driving their car, you know, it's like, what was the guy, what kind of car was he driving? And they'll say, oh, a BMW and then everyone's like, yeah, and they may have left out that detail. So that's all just sort of active participation in the conversation. Precisely. No shade toward BMW drivers, by the way. I'm not sure why I said that car. We're also so good at this whole thing that we can interrupt while someone's telling a story without taking away from the story.

36:26For example, if you're sitting there having dinner with somebody and they're telling a story and you say, hey, pass the potatoes. it doesn't actually like derail the conversation. The person's not offended. You're just you're just fitting that in there so you can eat the potatoes and enjoy them while you're hearing the story, too. Yeah. And that's that can happen even. I mean, dinner party is such a good sort of experiment because it's everyone seated around and looking at each other and all these conversations are happening that you can even do that to someone else at the table during someone's story.

36:58if the potatoes are closer. But you might do it in a hushed tone, like during the middle of their story. Hey, can you pass the potatoes? Yeah. And that person may even go, they're so good. Like something like that. What kind of potatoes did you imagine when I said pass the potatoes? Mashed. Did you? I, for some reason, thought of steamed or baked red potatoes. And then I was like, those are no good. So I changed it to scallop potatoes, which are great. Oh, man. You ever think everything, don't you? I totally do. And then I thought about, Yuma makes really good scalloped potatoes. It just kind of kept going from there.

37:34I wonder what Chuck's talking about right now. Right, exactly. No, I was listening, too. That is a bit of a talent. I can listen and do that at the same time. Okay. What? Exactly. I think this is kind of really interesting. There's a Georgetown University linguist named Deborah Tannen who did a fun little experiment where she transcribed conversations between two Californians, three New Yorkers, and a Londoner. and this should come as no surprise, New Yorkers talked over everybody. And when they did it with a fellow New Yorker, the other New Yorker just kept talking, and they were just sort of talking over each other, and they were still enthusiastic and having a good time.

38:11But when a New Yorker talked over a Californian or a Londoner, they would stop talking. Other people, you know, when they went back and looked at it, others viewed it as like these New Yorkers are dominating the conversation. They just want to take over anytime I said anything. the New Yorkers were just like, hey, it's all good. This is what we do. And they found that as far as New Yorkers and the New Yorkers also thought that like no one joined in. Like when they stopped talking, they were like, well, I guess they didn't want to talk or whatever because they're not interrupting me. Right. Exactly.

38:45But they did find that other scholars have found that there are these New York like patterns in other cultures, Samoan, Japanese and Italian American. And so that's why every Italian-American New York family, all they do is just sit around and scream over each other all the time. And Japanese stood out to me and I'm like, that doesn't sound right. And then I thought of, have you ever seen a Japanese like morning talk show? Oh, sure. Yeah. So somebody like a guest or some other anchor or something will be talking and then one of the hosts will interject usually a question before the person has finished talking.

39:20And the person stops saying what they were saying and answers that question and adjusts without being offended at all. So it actually happens quite a bit and usually toward the end of a sentence or a story or something like that. But it does happen a lot. Whereas American English speakers, you are done speaking, then the person starts speaking, or else you have transgressed on that person's turn. For sure. Should we take a break? Yeah. All right. We'll take a break and finish up right after this. Stuxnet. Who? Stuxnet. Stuxnet. I don't know what that is. You know what Stuxnet is. Is that in this?

39:56Stuxnet. Stuxnet. It's a great name. Yeah. That's the name of it. I know. It's a great name. All right. Stuxnet with an X. New year, new goals, and in this economy, a better money plan is more necessary than ever. I am Matt. And I'm Joel. We are from the How to Money podcast, and every week we help you to spend smarter, save more, and make sense of what's going on out there. If you want 2026 to be the year you finally feel in control of your money, we're here to give you the tools and advice to help you make it happen. Listen to How to Money on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

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42:44so we we talked about how um like all of these are scripts or templates like there's you say something and there's a predictable response and there's actually um you can boil it down to what are called families. So like different types of conversations fall into different kinds of families. The big ones that we've seen are reconstruction, moralizing, and projection, right? Yeah, reconstruction, you know, obviously reconstructing or remembering and sharing something about an event with somebody. The projective is looking to the future. Yeah. It could be very specific, like where are we going to dinner or just more like sitting around and chatting out loud about like the real future uh and then what was moral communication about good and good and bad yeah it's more about tearing people down or or complimenting people and we are we tend way more toward negativity tearing people down um rather than building people up and our tearing people down types of genres are way more intricate and sophisticated than our our building people up for complementing because we have a negative bias as a species.

43:57That's depressing. So we'll outgrow it one day. Just give us several tens of thousands of years. Yeah, so at the beginning we kind of talked, I think we gave an example of how this might be used, like on the job or something, and sort of practical applications do involve that for sure. Like you might be hired by a company to come in and consult when that company does, like, has kind of the same kind of conversation over and over with people. Like, if it's a surgical team or a call center, for sure, whenever you hear this call may be recorded for training and evaluation purposes, that's probably what they're doing right there.

44:34Or maybe just judging their own employees and how they're doing on the job. Right, for sure. They've also found you can help people get certain types of responses that you're looking for. Like we talked about the emergency psychiatric hospital where they wanted to get the person's name and then trick them into it. There was a guy named John Heritage, unsurprisingly from UCLA, who worked with doctors to figure out how they could get patients to volunteer more problems that they needed help with. And they found that doctors who say, is there anything else that you need help with today? Apparently, anything triggers a response, a predictable response, which is no.

45:16But if you change anything to something, that, for some reason, that particular script or template opens up the possibility of sharing more information. And you would just never figure that out. And this is one of the sterling examples of how conversation analysts like actually help things change for the better. Yeah, that was well said. Thank you. Way to go, John Heritage et al. A woman named Elizabeth Stokoe of the London School of Economics and Political Science found this when she studied conversations in a mediation service that people, it seems like in this case, people just kind of wanted to get down to brass tacks on what actually they did.

46:00They didn't want to hear things like, well, we don't take sides here and we don't judge. They really wanted to hear just sort of the step by step process of mediation and how it worked. Yes, she also works with companies that are trying to install customer service bots. And I was reading about that. It's not going very well. I bet. People hate customer service bots. Yes, I do. Yeah, I'm one of them too. There's a question of, okay, is the solution making these bots way more human-like? Should we insert things like have a bot say or, you know, like waffle like a human does? And from what I saw, the consensus is no, don't do that.

46:38Bots should be recognizable and volunteer themselves as bots. Humans are humans. Keep the two separate. And I don't know which direction it's going. It does kind of seem like the whole thing's in a quagmire currently. But I also did see that bots are poised to start taking over the reins from human conversation analysts and doing it themselves. And then training bots how to be better at their job. So one bot training another bot. That's, from what I can tell, the future of conversation analysis. Yeah, I mean, with the movie Her that now is like kind of freakily ahead of its time with Scarlett Johansson, I think in that situation they definitely wanted to make her way more human and do things like stumble words and make mistakes.

47:31But if it's something like a customer service bot, you don't want that. I don't want it at all, but I definitely don't want one that's like, I just goofed. Aren't I cute? Exactly. LOL. So let's get down to it, though, Chuck. Here's the real reason we started talking about this. Do men interrupt women as much as people think? Well, I mean, this has been something that they've studied a lot since the 70s about, you know, the roles that that plays. And it's been mixed results. There have been studies that found that men interrupt women much more. There's some that found there's not much of a difference.

48:10There was a meta-analysis from 1998 that found that gender divide becomes more clear-cut when looking at intrusive, specifically intrusive interruptions as to cooperative interruptions. And that's kind of what I took away is that it seems like when men are interrupting, it is definitely more intrusive, maybe mansplaining. Sure. I don't know. Yeah. And women interrupt maybe just as often, but it's much more of the cooperative type. Right. And they chalk this up to different kinds of upbringings where girls who become women are raised to essentially socialize through communication, through conversation.

48:51So they become masters at it, but they also develop expectations that men don't necessarily fulfill, like cooperative interruptions. Like, oh, that's right. You don't say. If a man doesn't do that, the woman might feel like she's not being listened to. And conversely, boys are raised in a hierarchical manner where they might eventually come to see listening as a form of submission where instead they're trying to dominate. They want to be the alpha male. They want their puffy vest to be the coolest at their kid's football game. And so not only are they not going to cooperatively interrupt, they're not even going to listen and they may interrupt competitively too.

49:37So there's a lot of at least anecdotal data to back that up for sure. Yeah, and I think they also found that men tend to interrupt more in groups than a one-on-one. And that definitely seems to fall in line with, like, you know, trying to establish the power position. And, like, if you're working together in a group. They did also find another interesting correlation where in studies where the first author of the study was a woman, they found bigger differences. And that just could be that the male and female researchers are coding the interruptions in a different way. Pretty interesting. I thought so too.

50:16What about generationally? Well, so apparently Gen Z is just throwing a huge wrench in the works. Remember we talked about how at the hospital, the emergency hospital, when somebody called and they said, my name is, may I help you? Right. The other person felt obligated to give their name. That's not true. Like when we were growing up, you would not feel like you had to say, oh, well, I'm Josh Clark and here's what I need from you. You just say, oh, hey, I need this or whatever. That's an example of a generational change that took place. Now it's even more pronounced apparently with Gen Z. There's something called the Gen Z stare where they're essentially pulling a Josh where you can tell them a story and they just stare back at you blankly at the end when it's their turn.

51:01And apparently it's fairly widespread. Yeah, I've heard about it. And then I was like, what is that? Then I read up about it. And it is very disconcerting, as is the phone call thing, which I haven't experienced because people don't call each other much anymore. But apparently, Gen Z, when they answer a phone, they don't go, hello. They expect the other person to talk first. So apparently there's a Gen Z thing where they just answer the phone like this. Yeah. And then the other person goes, hello. Hello? Do you need help? That's what I would say. Yeah. And I mean, I guess I've definitely witnessed the Gen Z stare with friends, kids here and there to where you're just like, boy, I just like I must be the least interesting human on Earth because they're just blankly looking at me.

51:50Yeah. Yeah. Or you can look at it the other way and be like, good talking to you. I'll see you later. Yeah, but I've also found, especially when you're around teenagers, like your friends that have teenage kids, like just don't even, you know, maybe say something nice and hello, but don't try to strike up a conversation. They don't want to talk to you. No, they don't. Just don't. I think that's been true since Tuk Tuk was a teenager, you know what I mean? You know what I usually do? I'll go like, oh, hey, how's it going? How's school going this year? Oh, good, good. Glad to hear it. And I'll just walk away.

52:24Like a nice thing to say and then just end it. You don't follow up with like, are you really anxious when you wake up in the morning before school? No, no, no, no. No one wants to hear from an adult if you're of a certain age. Okay. I'm going to have to rethink my approach then. Do you remember when you were a kid? Like, I don't remember even having conversations with adults. Oh, yeah, no, absolutely not. You know I'm totally kidding this in everything I'm saying, right? Oh, yeah, yeah, of course. Yeah, no, I remember that. It was very intimidating to talk to an adult, let alone having very little in common.

52:59Yeah. And they didn't want to talk to us. No. No, for sure. Gen X was famously ignored by most adults. Yeah. Very famous. Just ask Douglas Copeland. Who's that? He's the guy who wrote Gen X. Oh, okay. Was that a book? A famous book? Yes. I believe he's the one who coined the term. Oh, all right. Good for him. You should read it. It's good. It's a quick read. It's not like an essay or anything like that. I bet it's a story about three Gen Xers and just going through life over, I think, just the course of a few days. I've been a reading fool lately. I'll put it on the list. Nice. I just started Infinite Jest, and I'll bet I regret ever announcing it publicly.

53:38Is that David Foster Wallace? Yes, and I love that guy, but this is a slog already. Yeah, I'm finishing. I just finished the Bono book that I put down like a year ago, And I am almost done with the Don Felder of the Eagles. Good Lord. You might be asking, why would you read that? It's specifically because I used to love the Eagles, and apparently the book was just really bitchy. Oh, okay, yeah. So I was like, ooh, I want to read this, because he's like, he hates those guys. So let me read this. Did Matthew Modine recommend you read it in his diary about Full Metal Jacket? No, that's my bathroom book, so I've just been slow rolling that one.

54:20Gotcha. I don't think you should use words like slow rolling when you talk about being in the bathroom. Good point. Well, I think we just brought about listener mail, whether we like it or not, don't you? That's right. This is not a really correction, just sort of maybe a gentle reminder about our history of orthodonture. I feel like we might have focused a little too much on appearance. This is from Aaron. And hey, guys, appreciate the depth of curiosity you bring to each topic. And I wanted to offer an update regarding orthodontia. It's not just about appearance anymore. The field has evolved significantly, and current research shows that strong connection between jaw and bite alignment and conditions like sleep apnea, ADHD, and TMJ dysfunction, which is, of course, totally true.

55:03While some of these links were suspected years ago, orthodontic treatment today is increasingly focused on preventing or mitigating these issues in the ute before they become chronic. On a personal note, my journey with TMJ dysfunction led me down the path of exploring treatment options, and after years of discomfort, I found relief through Invisalign. It not only helped with my smile, it realigned my bite and significantly reduced my TMJ symptoms and opened my eyes to the broader health benefits of orthodontic care. And that is warm regards from Aaron. Very nice email. Aaron Invisi. Right. Yeah, exactly.

55:37Thanks a lot, Aaron. I'm really glad. Aaron with an E or a double A or one A? That's E-R-I-N. Thanks a lot, Aaron. I'm glad that you were able to take care of your TMJ. I can't imagine that that's a fun chronic condition, you know? If you got rid of a condition that you're happy about, we want to hear about that. Or for whatever reason you want to write in, you can send us an email. Send it off to stuffpodcasts at iheartradio.com. Stuff You Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app. Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

56:42age. Listen as I attempt to build a real startup run by fake people. Check out the second season of my podcast, Shell Game, on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts. You know, we always say new year, new me, but real change starts on the inside. It starts with giving your mind and your spirit the same attention you give your goals. Hey, everybody, it's Michelle Williams, host of Checking In on the Black Effect Podcast Network. And on my podcast, We talk mental health, healing, growth, and everything you need to step into your next season, whole and empowered. New year, real you.

57:19Listen to Checking In with Michelle Williams from the Black Effect Podcast Network on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. All right, son. Time to put out this campfire. Dad, we learned about this in school. Oh, did you now? Okay. What's first? Smokey Bear said to. First, drown it with a bucket of water, then stir it with a shovel. Wow, you sound just like him. Then he said, if it's still warm, then do it again. Where can I learn all this? It's all on SmokeyBear.com with other wildfire prevention tips. Because only you can prevent wildfires. Brought to you by the USDA Forest Service, your state forester and the Ad Council.

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