Think of traveling a well-known road: As the route becomes familiar, you may no longer register street names or scenery. You may even let your mind wander.
Something similar takes place in our relationships.
While researching her latest book, You’re Not Listening: What You’re Missing and Why It Matters, journalist Kate Murphy noticed an unexpected, counterintuitive quirk: We tend to listen less carefully to folks closest to us because we think we already know what they’re going to say.
To investigate what has become known as the “closeness-communications bias,” University of Chicago and Williams College researchers designed a test resembling a parlor game. Two couples sat inside a circle facing away from one another and took turns reading ambiguous everyday phrases, for example, “What have you been up to?”
When asked what the speaker was trying to say, listeners might guess if the phrase conveyed interest in someone’s well-being, irritation in a person’s late arrival, or suspicion of romantic infidelity.
Though spouses believed they'd easily pass this test, researchers found the couples understood each other no better than strangers — and sometimes worse. Similar results occurred when the experiment was replicated with friends.
Study leader Kenneth Savitsky, PhD, a Williams College psychology professor, says many people in close relationships may indeed be on the same wavelength — just not as much as they might think. “You get rushed and preoccupied, and also you stop taking the perspective of your partner, precisely because the two of you are so close.”
Like the oft-traveled road, familiarity in relationships can breed inattentiveness. But unlike that road, the folks in our lives constantly change. When we rely on the past to understand someone in the present, we might overlook the person she or he has become.
Become a Better Listener
To hone your listening skills, Kate Murphy offers the following advice:
- Listen to learn. When you leave a conversation, ask yourself, What did I find out about that person? How did that individual feel about what we were talking about?
- Stay curious. By asking questions of those you know well, and then listening carefully, you show they retain your interest and concern as they inevitably evolve.
- Truly stay tuned. Rather than focusing on your own thoughts, attempt to pick up on the subtext of what someone is saying and notice the subtle nonverbal details.
- Don't rush to reply. It's OK to say, \”I don't know what to say.\” You honor what the other person has said by taking time for you to think about it.
- Listen to opposing views. Learning other people arrived at their conclusions can inform your own. And listening may, consequently, encourage others to listen to you.