Feeling unheard? Here’s how to bridge gaps in everyday chats

If you feel frustrated in conversation these days, you’re not alone. People often report not feeling heard. This is a missed opportunity, because we all want to feel seen and heard. And it makes a big difference to how discussions go.

Experiments show that, even when talking about highly charged ideological topics, if one person listens attentively and is receptive to the other’s ideas, the other person is likely to also listen and become more receptive.

In addition to not feeling heard, we often grossly over-estimate how clearly we’ve made a point.

A 2022 study found that when someone asked an ambiguous question in a conversation, both parties thought its meaning was understood almost three-quarters of the time, when they were actually on the same page less than half of the time! That’s a massive understanding gap. (Participants overestimated their shared understanding even when they were speaking different languages, apparently expecting that meaning could be gleaned from tone of voice.)

There’s another major way that discussions get confused and frustrating. People get tripped up on this: what type of question are we even talking about?

Imagine a hypothetical chat about college education. There are different kinds of questions that might come up, each with different goals.

Factual questions

Contrary to what some may say, there are straightforward facts. How can you tell if you’re having a conversation about facts? It centers on closed-ended questions with clear answers.

“How many course credits do you need to graduate from your college? How much is tuition? How many pages of reading do you get assigned in an average week?”

These are questions about facts.

Subjective experience questions

A survey found that a majority of US college students said they censor themselves on sensitive topics.

“How do you feel about stating your actual opinions on sensitive topics? What do you think would happen if you did?”

These types of questions are much more open-ended, without one right or wrong answer. Of course, someone’s subjective experience doesn’t have to match with external reality. A student might be very worried about speaking on sensitive topics, but that doesn’t mean that anything bad would actually happen to them if they did.

Abstract questions

These ones aren’t just about straightforward facts or personal experiences. They involve making a broader judgment.

“How well does the college education system work?”

It’s really hard to come to accurate conclusions on big questions like this! In workshops I’ve facilitated, perhaps the biggest roadblock I’ve seen to higher-quality conversations is getting stuck in abstract and vague judgments people can’t agree on.

The first issue is that people aren’t clear what they’re talking about.

“How well does the college education system work?” is a very vague question. What does “work” mean? Which schools are we considering? Which departments in those schools? “Work” for whom?

Depending on how big questions are approached, they could be answered to a degree by specific facts, by personal experiences, or be very difficult to answer at all.

The second issues is that usually when discussions move to abstract topics like how well the education system works, people are actually thinking about particular experiences.

One person remembers how her child struggled in a college class because the teacher assigned too much homework. Then she imagines this as a generalized pattern that applies broadly to all college education (the technical name for this is inductive reasoning). But she doesn’t tell the specific story about her child. She shares only the abstract judgment: “I think the college education system is a failure because it’s too demanding!”

Her conversation partner had a good time in college and is proud that he got good grades, so he totally disagrees (also without sharing the personal experiences he’s thinking of).

This kind of talking past each other happens all the time, especially when people are trying to get attention or convince each other of a point.

Rhetoric

A quote often cited from an essay about problems with education is this, “The truth is that schools don’t really teach anything except how to obey orders.”

Sentences like this presumably aren’t intended to be taken literally. (We can guess that it means something less extreme like, “Schools focus too much on getting students to obey orders, although obviously students do learn some useful information and life lessons as well.”)

When rhetoric shows up in conversations, if it doesn’t make sense and you’re curious, it’s worth asking questions. Pause and take the conversation away from sweeping generalizations and inaccuracies and back to the specific and concrete.

“Sounds like you have some serious worries about the education system. I’m guessing you don’t actually believe that there isn’t one single thing that schools teach aside from obeying orders. So I’m curious, can you give me a specific example of something schools do well and something you’re concerned about with the school system?”

When people are invited to think in richer and more nuanced ways, conversations regularly go better.

Whatever the topic, and whether the conversation seems well-defined or is getting confused or extreme, research is clear: you’ll benefit from trying to ask questions and reflecting back what you hear. This makes sure you’ve understood what the person wants to say. Not only will this improve conversations, but people like conversation partners who ask them more questions.

Don’t underestimate how powerful this can be. At least on some issues, just a 10-minute conversation with a stranger who listens to you, and asks you the right questions to help you process your ideas and think through where you stand, is enough to create a lasting change in your views!

This post originally appeared on Psychology Today.