Open Thread February 25 - March 3

Scott Garrabrant

If it's worth saying, but not worth its own post (even in Discussion), then it goes here.

Does anyone have any advice about understanding implicit communication? I regularly interact with guessers and have difficulty understanding their communication. A fair bit of this has to do with my poor hearing, but I've had issues even on text based communication mediums where I understand every word.

My strategy right now is to request explicit confirmation of my suspicions, e.g., here's a recent online chat I had with a friend (I'm A and they're B):

A: Hey, how have you been?

B: I've been ok

B: working in the lab now

A: Okay. Just to be clear, do you mean that you don't want to be disturbed?

B: yeah

"[W]orking in the lab now" is ambiguous. This friend does sometimes chat online when working in the lab. But, I suspected that perhaps they didn't want to chat, so I asked explicitly.

Requesting explicit confirmation seems to annoy most guessers. I've heard quite a few times that I should "just know" what they mean. Perhaps they think that they have some sort of accurate mental model of others' intentions, but I don't think any of us do. Many guessers have been wrong about my thoughts.

I suspect there probably is no good general strategy other than asking for explicit confirmation. Trying to make guessers be askers is tempting, though probably bound to fail in general.

Some more Guess/Hint culture suggestions.

Consider:

B: working in the lab now
A: (suspecting, as you did, that perhaps B didn't want to chat) oh ok. give me a buzz when you're free?

This will typically communicate that you've understood that they're busy and don't want to chat, that you're OK with that, and that you want to talk to them.

That said, there exist Guess/Hint cultures in which it also communicates that you have something urgent to talk about, because if you didn't you would instead have said:

B: working in the lab now
A: oh, ok. bye!

...which ... (read more)

7TheOtherDave12y

It's worth remembering that there is no single Guess/Hint culture. Such high-context cultures depend on everyone sharing a specific set of interpretation rules, allowing information to be conveyed through subtle signals (hints) rather than explicit messages. For my own part, I absolutely endorse asking for confirmation in any interaction among peers, taking responses to such requests literally, and disengaging if you don't get a response. If a Guess/Hint-culture native can't step out of their preferred mode long enough to give you a "yes" or "no," and you can't reliably interpret their hints, you're unlikely to have a worthwhile interaction anyway. With nonpeers, it gets trickier; disengaging (and asking in the first place) may have consequences you prefer to avoid. In which case I recommend talking to third parties who can navigate that particular Guess/Hint dialect, and getting some guidance from them. This can be as blatant as bringing them along to translate for you (or play Cyrano, online), or can be more like asking them for general pointers. (E.g. "I'm visiting a Chinese family for dinner. Is there anything I ought to know about how to offer compliments, ask for more food, turn down food I don't want, make specific requests about food? How do I know when I'm supposed to start eating, stop eating, leave? Are there rules I ought to know about who eats first? Etc. etc. etc.")

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Open Thread February 25 - March 3

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If it's worth saying, but not worth its own post (even in Discussion), then it goes here.

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Open Thread February 25 - March 3

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If it's worth saying, but not worth its own post (even in Discussion), then it goes here.

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