A study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences assigned 252 people into pairs of strangers and left them to talk about whatever they wanted for anywhere from 1-45 minutes. Then they conducted an exit interview with each participant asking when they would have preferred the conversation to wrap up.
They found that only two percent of conversations ended at the time both people wanted them to end.
Thirty percent finished when one person wanted it to end.
More than half of the time, both people wanted the conversation to be shorter, and only ten percent of the time, both wanted it to go longer.
In short, the study found that people were abysmal at reading the room.
When asked to guess when their partner wanted to stop, they, on average, participants were off by 64 percent of the length of the conversation.
The message here:
You’re probably not very good at assessing a conversational partner’s level of interest in what you have to say.
You’re probably talking too much and too often.
You’re probably not nearly as entertaining, engaging, or interesting as you think.
Want to avoid these pitfalls?
Talk less. Listen more.
Learn to speak more concisely.
Learn to tell great stories.
