> we present one novel possible explanation for the four-person conversation size constraint.
But we're not going to tell you in the abstract.
Why are conversations limited to about four people?
71–74 of 74 posts
Re: Why are conversations limited to about four people?
#72There's a reason why Roberts Rules, and other parliamentary procedures exist.
Once you get to ~10 people who all want to input something into the discussion, its completely and utterly impossible to move a discussion forward without a set of rules. Normally, one person who yells the loudest and ignores the most people eats up the entirety of conversation space.
As such, basic rules are invented. In Roberts Rules, its one-at-a-time, and at most contribute 2-times per any particular subject, at roughly 10-minutes maximum per person. The "Chairperson" controls the discussion to ensure the rules are applied equally to everyone, so that everyone gets a turn. If possible, the Chairperson is supposed to choose an order of people's speaking turns so that both sides of a discussion alternate back and forth (pros, then cons, then pros again. Etc. etc.).
Its slower, but it scales better. The unfortunate effect is that most people don't understand the point of Roberts Rules or Parliamentary procedure (there are many sets of rules, Roberts Rules are just the most common in the USA), so most people just see it as unnecessary set of rules that slow down a conversation.
Re: Why are conversations limited to about four people?
#73Earlier quoted context omitted.
> this is important because in a conversation, each member must project and rationalise each other communicator's response to a message Do they, though? Maybe I participate in conversations differently, but trying to unravel how A interpreted B's comment is not something I would do.
It's all I do. It's the only way I can understand if my next comment will offend or work as a joke or if I'm posing an interesting topic. It's what makes conversations so draining to an introvert I feel. The more people, the more I have to figure out what I can say to be ok with the group at hand.
As I posted below, there is a difference between observing how different people react to a particular comment (O(n)) and observing how different people react to a particular comment based on who it's from (O(n^2)). I'm mostly trying to question the idea that there's anything quadratic in the number of participants going on here. Are you sure you're saying that the work you do is quadratic?
Re: Why are conversations limited to about four people?
#74When I have a conversation, I like it to be back-and-forth: I say something, they react, I react to that, and so on, with reactions being things like asking a question, making an evaluation, saying I have had something similar happen to me, making a funny comment, and so on, so we go further and maybe deeper, a process I find rewarding.
The more people, the less often I get to react, and so it gets less enjoyable. On the other hand, with some groups we are on the same wavelength enough that a third person's reactions to the second person are enjoyable to me, too, so I am happy to just listen to their back-and-forth, at least for a while. Ditto if it is a subject being discussed that is really interesting.