[Link] Mainstreaming Tell Culture
Mainstreaming Tell Culture and other rational relationship strategies in this listicle for Lifehack, a very popular self-improvement website, as part of my broader project, Intentional Insights, of promoting rationality and science-based thinking to a broad audience. What are your thoughts about this piece?
My thoughts are that you probably havn’t read Malcolm’s post on communication cultures, or you disagree.
Roughly, different styles of communication cultures (guess, ask, tell) are supported by mutual assumptions of trust in different things (and product hurt and confusion in the absence of that trust). Telling someone you would enjoy a hug is likely to harm a relationship where the other person’s assumptions are aligned with ask or guess, even if you don’t expect the other person to automatically hug you!
You need to coordinate with people on what type of and which particular culture to use (and that coordination usually happens through inference and experimentation). I certainly expect people who happen to coordinate on a Tell Culture to do better, but I doubt that it works as an intervention, unless they make the underlying adjustments in trust.
Thanks for linking me to that post. I didn’t read it before, so I learned something new—appreciate it!
Yup, good point about the hug, this was written with the idea that the other would be committed to Tell Culture as well.
Agreed on the key importance of trust, which is point 7 of the list I made.
If you say that “tell culture” is science-based, which studies do you consider it’s basis?
Tell Culture is the phrase I use to gesture toward open and honest communication, which is supported by the research from the Gottman Institute I cited in the very beginning.
That does not mean it is the best way to communicate.
Not saying it is the best way to communicate :-) Just saying that the research supports the statement that open and honest communication is the optimal way to have happy and lasting relationships, which is the point of the article.
There are plenty of exceptions and caveats, as with any research—they apply to the majority, not all. However, one is most likely to win when going with the research unless there are clear reasons not to do so.
Are you talking exclusively about relationships? I’m reading Carnegie’s book and interested in similar materials.
The research is specifically about relationships, so this is the claim I make in the article.
Regarding winning friends and influencing people, open and honest communication is often not the best strategy to go. For the research on this, I’d suggest Cialdini’s Influence, it gets at many of the same issues as Carnegie but does so using research, and is thus quite a bit more worthwhile.
As far as Gottman goes: http://andrewgelman.com/2010/06/23/more_on_those_d/
Thanks for sharing that, interesting to know!
Why in the world is Tell Culture a “rational” relationship strategy?
And the “science-based tips” is just a slightly rephrased “one weird trick”.
Tell Culture is the phrase I use to talk about open and honest communication, and that is supported by research about it being one of the best modes to use to achieve the goal of having happy relationships. I would disagree on the science of it, I cite quite a bit of studies there :-)
That’s a misuse of the term. Guess Culture people are perfectly capable of communicating openly and honestly.
Maybe I’m confused. Guess Culture as I understand it is specifically about not being open and honest about one’s desires and feelings, and instead expecting others to read your mind and guess what you want through subtle hints as opposed to honest and clear statements. Do we have a shared understanding of Guess Culture?
No, we do not.
You understand wrong. Ask and Guess Cultures are two different styles of communication. Within both styles it’s possible to be open and honest or to be closed and manipulative.
People from Ask Culture tend to perceive Guess Culture style as opaque and misleading because it’s not their culture and they don’t know how to operate in it. If you don’t understand how it works, of course it doesn’t look “open” to you.
Ask Culture interactions tend to be simpler, but the loss of complexity is not necessarily an advantage. I’ll take flirting over “wanna fuck?” any day.
Alright, guess we come from different premises :-) I will agree to disagree on this
This is an ignorant assertion. Just because you call something a “style” doesn’t immunize it from criticism. Guess culture is an irrational method of communication driven by a bias to avoiding emotional pain or manipulating ambiguity to manipulate a person. Its impossible to reconcile Guess Culture with the rationality promoted by this site. You can UNDERSTAND it, but its incredibly hypocritical to ADVOCATE for communication based on cognitive bias while maintaining consistency with even the broadest ideology of this site.
As far as Ask Culture, again your substituting your anecdotal feelings for an argument. You were socialized to prefer a specific kind of interaction but that doesn’t mean its superior. Ask Culture is not synonymous with radical honesty with a question attached as you are implying.
Tell culture is indisputably the superior method of communication if you take away your personal bias. I can operate perfectly well under guess or ask culture since that’s your favorite excuse for people who prefer tell culture.
Democratic Socialism is superior to American Capitalism. Immediately pressing for a shift between the systems may not be feasible, as operating effectively in society on pure tell culture is not a super good strategy, but DS is still objectively superior to AC and the same for TC>AC>GC.
Um, you realize you sound like an idiot, right?