I find myself occasionally in conversations that aim at choosing one of two (or more) courses of action. Here are some patterns that arise that frustrate me:
A: We’ll get to City in an hour. When we’re there, do you want to do X? Or maybe Y? B: I haven’t thought about it yet, I’ve been dodging sheep and potholes. What do you want to do? A: Whatever you’re comfortable doing. B: Umm … Which is easier to get to? A: I don’t know. Or, we could do C, D, or E? B: Now I’m getting choice paralysis. A: Well, I wanted to see if you were really enthusiastic for any of them when I mentioned them. Like “Ooh, C, we have to do C, it’s awesome.” B: Are you enthusiastic for any of them? Or are there some that we can rule out because they’d be hard on you? A: Well, I’m not very interested in X but I’d do it if you wanted to. B: Wow, X was like the first option you proposed. I would have guessed that was the one you most favored. A: No, that was the one I thought you would most want to do. It sounds okay but not great to me.
(It may be relevant that A has a mild physical disability and self-describes as an introvert, while B self-describes as an extrovert diagnosed with depression and anxiety. Both are relatively neurotypical for around here.)
A: Where should we eat dinner tonight? Can you look on the search results for “City restaurants”? B: Well, there’s Anna’s Afghan, Caonima Chinese, Dack’s Deli, and Ed’s Ethiopian, plus a bunch of taquerias and burger joints. A: That’s too many options. Which are any good? B: I already filtered out the ones that really didn’t sound like we would like them. Like Pat’s Pork-Fat BBQ Smokestack. A: Ew, yeah, good idea, but it’s still too many. We should narrow it down. B: Okay, how about Dack’s Deli? I could go for a turkey avocado sandwich. A: How about Bob’s or … hey, there’s a second page of search results. Flora’s Flounder Fish, Greg’s Garlic Gustables, … B: Wait, I thought you said we needed to narrow down the list we already had? A: Well yes, we do. B: So, I nominated Dack’s Deli and you didn’t respond, and extended the list of candidates instead. Should I take that as meaning that you’re rejecting Dack’s Deli outright and narrow the list down? A: No, I just want more information. Any of these could turn out to suck. B: Well, sure, but we don’t need to find the very best budget restaurant in City. We just need to find one that is nice enough that we like it, A: Caonima Chinese has an alpaca on their logo, but I’m not sure I want to go to a restaurant that tells me to fuck my mom. B: Yeah, that is a little creepy. Mumble mumble hipsters mumble. A: So you really want to go to Dack’s Deli? B: Not particularly but since all we know about any of these is the listings, we might as well choose kind of arbitrarily. A: FIne, let’s do that.
(The deli turned out to be closed, but the fish & chip shop next door was fine.)
It feels like we’re running two different negotiation scripts. Mine (B) works by collecting a pool of candidate results (by brainstorming, or using a search engine, then filtering out things that we’re definitely not up for doing, then doing a tiny bit of stack ranking and presenting the list. A’s script seems to start out by proposing the option that A thinks I will like most, even if A doesn’t want that option very much, then falling back to “rattle off some results and see if any elicit +++ enthusiasm.
Assume that the conversational partners have heard of NVC, value of information, basic business negotiation; and also assume that one another are acting in good faith. The limiting factor is not “can we come to equitable terms?” or “is this going to lead to a big fight?” … it is more “can we more rapidly converge on a common-knowledge prediction of an enjoyable dinner, without spending huge mental effort on it up front?”
This happens to my spouse and me very often. We’ve gotten pretty good at noticing after the second “I dunno, what do you want to do” round that we need to switch from ask mode to tell mode. Don’t give options, just propose something, and say “any objection must take the form of a counterproposal” (yes, we say literally this sentence to each other a few times a week).
Especially when one partner is more tired than the other, we can instead just have the more engaged partner pick something and the tired one get one or two vetos before being forced to step up and actually accept something. This isn’t always comfortable, especially when it’s unclear that there exists a good solution.
“any objection must take the form of a counterproposal”
Most of my social circle says “dinner semantics” to mean exactly this. So far we’ve skirted but basically avoided the trap of gaming it by bluffing—proposing an option you know is unacceptable to force someone else to propose.
It sounds to me as though the problem is that neither of you are very enthusiastic about any of the choices. One possibility is to identify a list of what’s tolerable and then use a random method for choosing.
Another is to talk with each other about what each of you really like at a time when you aren’t distracted and tired.
It’s conceivable that one or both of you aren’t good at remembering what you really like, in which case keeping records would help.
Along the same lines, although less generally applicable but with higher potential payoff; if neither person is very enthusiastic about an activity, it is worth looking at ways to eliminate it, change it, or automate it.
For example, if you are not enthusiastic about going out to eat, you might look at eating at home; if you do not want to go into the city, perhaps only one of you should go, or perhaps you can look into way to order goods online and complete tasks remotely.
The pro and con list of each of these modifications is long, and any given solution might work for you. However, I have had good results from deleting ‘meh’ activities from my routines, and things like hanging out with your SO and eating are really supposed to be intrinsically motivating, not exercises in satisficing.
I would usually approach these types of decisions by doing research in advance, so that the options can be considered when not driving over potholes and hungry.
For example, the day before going to a city, A and B could each look up yelp reviews of restaurants in the city, and each write down a first choice and a second choise of the restaurants they would most like to go to, given constraints (eg. close to their other destination, open at the right time.) Then they could compare lists, and discuss, and decide which restaurant to go to before even leaving for the destination.
My impression from reading the conversations is that A and B are relatively good at communicating. They have different styles of communicating and different preferences. Over time, A and B might get to know each other’s preferences better and be able to predict how the other person will respond with more accuracy, and that may shorten the amount of time it takes. I’m not sure there is a shortcut to convergence. The problem may be more that you are discussing things when tired and hungry and doing other things such as driving. If you have such conversations while you are both feeling kind of crappy, it may take longer to sort things out than if you discuss when in better circumstances.
I find myself occasionally in conversations that aim at choosing one of two (or more) courses of action. Here are some patterns that arise that frustrate me:
A: We’ll get to City in an hour. When we’re there, do you want to do X? Or maybe Y?
B: I haven’t thought about it yet, I’ve been dodging sheep and potholes. What do you want to do?
A: Whatever you’re comfortable doing.
B: Umm … Which is easier to get to?
A: I don’t know. Or, we could do C, D, or E?
B: Now I’m getting choice paralysis.
A: Well, I wanted to see if you were really enthusiastic for any of them when I mentioned them. Like “Ooh, C, we have to do C, it’s awesome.”
B: Are you enthusiastic for any of them? Or are there some that we can rule out because they’d be hard on you?
A: Well, I’m not very interested in X but I’d do it if you wanted to.
B: Wow, X was like the first option you proposed. I would have guessed that was the one you most favored.
A: No, that was the one I thought you would most want to do. It sounds okay but not great to me.
(It may be relevant that A has a mild physical disability and self-describes as an introvert, while B self-describes as an extrovert diagnosed with depression and anxiety. Both are relatively neurotypical for around here.)
A: Where should we eat dinner tonight? Can you look on the search results for “City restaurants”?
B: Well, there’s Anna’s Afghan, Caonima Chinese, Dack’s Deli, and Ed’s Ethiopian, plus a bunch of taquerias and burger joints.
A: That’s too many options. Which are any good?
B: I already filtered out the ones that really didn’t sound like we would like them. Like Pat’s Pork-Fat BBQ Smokestack.
A: Ew, yeah, good idea, but it’s still too many. We should narrow it down.
B: Okay, how about Dack’s Deli? I could go for a turkey avocado sandwich.
A: How about Bob’s or … hey, there’s a second page of search results. Flora’s Flounder Fish, Greg’s Garlic Gustables, …
B: Wait, I thought you said we needed to narrow down the list we already had?
A: Well yes, we do.
B: So, I nominated Dack’s Deli and you didn’t respond, and extended the list of candidates instead. Should I take that as meaning that you’re rejecting Dack’s Deli outright and narrow the list down?
A: No, I just want more information. Any of these could turn out to suck.
B: Well, sure, but we don’t need to find the very best budget restaurant in City. We just need to find one that is nice enough that we like it,
A: Caonima Chinese has an alpaca on their logo, but I’m not sure I want to go to a restaurant that tells me to fuck my mom.
B: Yeah, that is a little creepy. Mumble mumble hipsters mumble.
A: So you really want to go to Dack’s Deli?
B: Not particularly but since all we know about any of these is the listings, we might as well choose kind of arbitrarily.
A: FIne, let’s do that.
(The deli turned out to be closed, but the fish & chip shop next door was fine.)
It feels like we’re running two different negotiation scripts. Mine (B) works by collecting a pool of candidate results (by brainstorming, or using a search engine, then filtering out things that we’re definitely not up for doing, then doing a tiny bit of stack ranking and presenting the list. A’s script seems to start out by proposing the option that A thinks I will like most, even if A doesn’t want that option very much, then falling back to “rattle off some results and see if any elicit +++ enthusiasm.
Assume that the conversational partners have heard of NVC, value of information, basic business negotiation; and also assume that one another are acting in good faith. The limiting factor is not “can we come to equitable terms?” or “is this going to lead to a big fight?” … it is more “can we more rapidly converge on a common-knowledge prediction of an enjoyable dinner, without spending huge mental effort on it up front?”
This happens to my spouse and me very often. We’ve gotten pretty good at noticing after the second “I dunno, what do you want to do” round that we need to switch from ask mode to tell mode. Don’t give options, just propose something, and say “any objection must take the form of a counterproposal” (yes, we say literally this sentence to each other a few times a week).
Especially when one partner is more tired than the other, we can instead just have the more engaged partner pick something and the tired one get one or two vetos before being forced to step up and actually accept something. This isn’t always comfortable, especially when it’s unclear that there exists a good solution.
Most of my social circle says “dinner semantics” to mean exactly this. So far we’ve skirted but basically avoided the trap of gaming it by bluffing—proposing an option you know is unacceptable to force someone else to propose.
It sounds to me as though the problem is that neither of you are very enthusiastic about any of the choices. One possibility is to identify a list of what’s tolerable and then use a random method for choosing.
Another is to talk with each other about what each of you really like at a time when you aren’t distracted and tired.
It’s conceivable that one or both of you aren’t good at remembering what you really like, in which case keeping records would help.
Along the same lines, although less generally applicable but with higher potential payoff; if neither person is very enthusiastic about an activity, it is worth looking at ways to eliminate it, change it, or automate it.
For example, if you are not enthusiastic about going out to eat, you might look at eating at home; if you do not want to go into the city, perhaps only one of you should go, or perhaps you can look into way to order goods online and complete tasks remotely.
The pro and con list of each of these modifications is long, and any given solution might work for you. However, I have had good results from deleting ‘meh’ activities from my routines, and things like hanging out with your SO and eating are really supposed to be intrinsically motivating, not exercises in satisficing.
I would usually approach these types of decisions by doing research in advance, so that the options can be considered when not driving over potholes and hungry.
For example, the day before going to a city, A and B could each look up yelp reviews of restaurants in the city, and each write down a first choice and a second choise of the restaurants they would most like to go to, given constraints (eg. close to their other destination, open at the right time.) Then they could compare lists, and discuss, and decide which restaurant to go to before even leaving for the destination.
My impression from reading the conversations is that A and B are relatively good at communicating. They have different styles of communicating and different preferences. Over time, A and B might get to know each other’s preferences better and be able to predict how the other person will respond with more accuracy, and that may shorten the amount of time it takes. I’m not sure there is a shortcut to convergence. The problem may be more that you are discussing things when tired and hungry and doing other things such as driving. If you have such conversations while you are both feeling kind of crappy, it may take longer to sort things out than if you discuss when in better circumstances.