Lifestyle

Pointless small talk is preventing you from being happy

Love it or hate it, chances are that you generated it, enjoyed it or endured it sometime today. The “it” in question is small talk. It includes chit-chat about subway delays, housing prices and what your kid ate for breakfast this morning. As confirmed in a 2010 UK study, nine out of 10 people converse about the weather every six hours.

Dan Ariely and Kristen Berman, founders of the behavioral consulting company Irrational Labs, decided to do something about it. According to their story in Wired, they put on a dinner party and banned all small talk. This was for good reason. According to the Wired story, written by Ariely and Berman, “Research has confirmed what most people know but don’t practice: surface level small talk does not build relationships and it is not great for our happiness levels.”

Besides the chat rule, guests also were forced to arrive between 7:30 and 8:00 p.m. “The benefit of having the whole group together from the start amplified the experience for everyone,” the authors wrote.

Apparently it worked, at least in terms of verbal discourse. Conversational topics ranged from kidney donation to suicide prevention to “the art of the dominatrix.”

But did it make for a better party? Ariely and Berman believe that the outcome was increased happiness all around.

“As added proof,” they write, “two dates came out of the evening. Perhaps meaningful conversation also makes us more attractive?”

Probably. According to a State University of New York at Stony Brook study, the asking of deeper questions leads to enhanced connectedness. Indeed, as Ariely and Berman advise, “At your next dinner party, remember the wine, the music and the rules.”