2021
The vital art of talking to strangers (2021)
21–30 of 175 posts
Re: The vital art of talking to strangers (2021)
#22For people who work in defense, strangers randomly talking to them is always a sticky point.
yea, living near an us overseas base, you gotta be careful with questions about their $dayjob
Re: The vital art of talking to strangers (2021)
#23I sometimes overcompensate for anxiety by being chatty and over familiar, but since I’ve had kids it’s also behaviour that I think is important for them to see. It makes my day when I have a positive interaction with a stranger but I also want my kids to know people are mostly kind and interesting and it’s okay to feel confident around them.
Having kids is a great way to lower the barrier. As a parent with autism ('introvert') it is also a great way to overstep my boundaries. Like, I have to, even if I don't want to. My secret weapons are smiling and talking to my kid.
Re: The vital art of talking to strangers (2021)
#24I'm always surprised that so few people on planes talk to each other. It is amazing how a talk to the person next to you on a plane can turn a boring, multiple hour long flight into a nice experience that feels way shorter.
On the other hand, I’ve seen not an insignificant number of cases where someone overstepped a boundary by forcing a conversation on someone who was clearly not into it. I think it’s ok to try, but given the context, cultural differences, legal requirement to stay in your assigned seat, it might be easy to get confused about consent.
Where is there a legal requirement to stay in your assigned seat? I've switched seats with people plenty of times on airplanes, or simply moved into empty rows. If you want to switch you can simply ask. (That is, if you're not afraid to talk to strangers!)
Re: The vital art of talking to strangers (2021)
#25The cultural differences about this are vast even in the United States. In the part of the Midwest where I grew up, strangers would come up and offer compliments about your outfit or car, make friendly small talk in the grocery store checkout line, or at least offer a quiet "hi" and smile when passing on the sidewalk. In the Pacific Northwest, we try not to even look at each other when passing, although people are fr…
I live in a small mountain town now, and it's unthinkable you would walk past someone on the sidewalk and not say hi.
Re: The vital art of talking to strangers (2021)
#26The cultural differences about this are vast even in the United States. In the part of the Midwest where I grew up, strangers would come up and offer compliments about your outfit or car, make friendly small talk in the grocery store checkout line, or at least offer a quiet "hi" and smile when passing on the sidewalk. In the Pacific Northwest, we try not to even look at each other when passing, although people are fr…
No one is friendly in urban areas because you are getting accosted / hustled so often. If a stranger tries to talk to me I have to give an ocular pat down and risk assessment before engaging beyond a skeptical glance.
Re: The vital art of talking to strangers (2021)
#27The cultural differences about this are vast even in the United States. In the part of the Midwest where I grew up, strangers would come up and offer compliments about your outfit or car, make friendly small talk in the grocery store checkout line, or at least offer a quiet "hi" and smile when passing on the sidewalk. In the Pacific Northwest, we try not to even look at each other when passing, although people are fr…
The PNW can get to talking eventually but it’s like pulling teeth before it catches.
Maybe a better analogy is starting a lawnmower.
Re: The vital art of talking to strangers (2021)
#28They say talking to strangers helps you work on social anxiety, and that people really won't remember you, but I get the impression from this thread that people will remember you for the rest of their lives and tell all their friends about how weird you were.
Re: The vital art of talking to strangers (2021)
#29I doubt gregarious people need more data to cold start social interactions (I certainly don’t)
Similarly, non social people aren’t that way because the data suggests it’s better, and data isn’t going to change that
Rather some mix of biological differences in attention, cognitive arousal styles and environmental conditioning determine sociality
The more interesting question to me is “what are the environmental and structural contexts that maximize ‘high engagement’ prosociality?”
With the follow on “via what means would we modify our current environment to realize that optimization”
Re: The vital art of talking to strangers (2021)
#30I'm always surprised that so few people on planes talk to each other. It is amazing how a talk to the person next to you on a plane can turn a boring, multiple hour long flight into a nice experience that feels way shorter.
I would suggest it’s simply because flights are often much longer than a subway ride. Making small talk for six, eight, twelve hours isn’t really fun for anyone.