Transcript of journalist and senior media executive Richard Sergay's interview with Guy Itzchakov for the “Stories of Impact” series.
Watch the video version of the interview.
Find the transcript from Netta Weinstein, who is also featured in the video, here.
Richard Sergay (interviewer)
Guy Itzchakov (interviewee)
I’m Guy Itzchakov, an assistant professor from the University of Haifa, from the Department of Human Services.
Q. Why did you decide to study listening?
That’s an interesting question. I’ve been intrigued by, early in my research career, by a phenomena called the Boomerang Effect. Where people try to change the attitudes of other people by basically, simply put, arguing with them, and they get the opposite result, they get, the attitude of the recipient becomes even more extreme and more bolster, in the opposite direction of the intention of the message provider. And one of the main mechanisms that works, that operates in the boomerang effects is defensiveness. When people are, when people are in an argument, like we see in our society, very frequently nowadays, when I feel that my freedom to hold a certain attitude is threatened, I might become defensive, and instead of hearing your arguments, when you are talking, I will be thinking how to, how to counterattack your um, your message. And this is, this is the type of conversation I often see, where, where I live. And then together with my PhD advisor, Professor Avi Kluger, from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. We thought about listening as the opposite or as a remedy to, to— to this phenomena, or to— basically to all kind of— phenomena, at least defensiveness. Because when people feel really listened to, and this is, this goes back to the work by Carl Rogers, back in 1951, he, Rogers argued that people become more relaxed, more open-minded, when they feel that the other person does not judge what they say. Um, and we thought it would be intriguing to test whether merely listening, it’s not merely, it’s a lot more— it’s a difficult process, but listening in and of itself can result in an attitude change of the speaker, without the listener providing a persuasive attempt. And this was my focal project during my graduate studies, and this has been the topic that I’ve been working on for the past ten years now.
Q. What is listening, what does it mean to listen?
So, listening in an interpersonal context is both complex and holistic. It includes three main primary dimensions. Attention, which is constant eye contact, facial expression that conveys attentiveness. Comprehension, which is understanding such as asking questions that promote the needs of the speaker, rather than the curiosity of the listener and many more sorts of good questions. I usually call it open questions and providing reflections to ensure understanding and a positive intention that is conveyed mainly by empathy and by a non-judgmental approach towards the speaker. It does not mean however, that the listener needs to agree with what the speaker is saying, but to accept the right of the speaker to hold a certain point of view. The holistic part is, that even though listening is quite complex, one paper identified more than 50 different definitions of listening, people tend to grasp it, rather holistically. So people are pretty quick to acknowledge if the other person is genuinely listening to them, or faking it or, does not even seem to be paying, listening and paying attention at all. So it’s a, it’s a very interesting construct.
Q. There are both verbal and nonverbal cues to listening?
Yeah, this is correct. There is a—
There are, there are both, I will say one sentence in order to get to it. One of the misconceptions that people make is that the speaker is the active person in the conversation and the listener is rather a passive actor, that— basically this misconception is because people equate listening with hearing or listening with silence. And, and the listener actually determines at least 50% of the conversation of where the conversation will go using both verbal signals, such as a uttering, question asking, paraphrasing, and nonverbal behavior such as a body posture, head nodding, and this sets of behavior is called back channel, back channel behavior. This is the route through which the listener determines a vast amount of the conversation. So, for example, we can be conversing and you can say something and when you’re speaking, you have these automatic thoughts that come to your head and a few of them, sometimes even many of them, relate to your social appearance. So, does the listener approve of me, how do I look in the eye of the, of the listener. And if for example, I, as a listener, will present facial expressions that convey curiosity like opening my eyes and leaning towards you and nodding when appropriate, not too much, but when appropriate, you will perceive that I’m really there with you. On the contrary, if when you say something, I will go like this or do like this with my arms, you will, we will probably see that your voice changes a bit, you will, you will become a little more apprehensive, there are actually studies showing how listeners affect the speech fluency and even the memory of the speakers. So, the listener is a very, very, very active partner in the conversation and this is through both the verbal and nonverbal channels that the listener has.
Q. How would you describe good listening on an interpersonal level, what is good listening?
Good listening, first of all includes constant eye contact of the listener with the speaker. When we converse with other people, when we listen to people, their eyes will not be focused at us as listeners, most of the time. And we can see that the— the gaze of the speaker will go all around the room especially if they introspect, but every few seconds, even sometimes with, outside of awareness, the speaker will look back at the listener to see if the listener is still paying attention. I equate it to a child playing and wanting freedom, but every few minutes looking back to see if the parent is still there. And when the listener sees the speaker is still paying attention or maintaining constant eye contact, the listener gains confidence and by that the speaker helps sorry, the listener helps the speaker get rid of all these automatic and disturbing thoughts of how do I appear, do I, how do I, do I make sense, and can better delve deeper into what they’re saying. So, this is one aspect. Another, which is very, very important is: know how to ask good questions. A good question conveys that the listener is really trying to understand or even understands what the speaker is saying. And it can be a simple question such as, so, Richard, you told me that lately you had this emotional experience at work with your manager, how did it feel, And there is a difference— all— differences in the type of questions that might seem minor, but there are not, for example, a difference between a how and why question. Like how did it happen versus why did it happen. So, a why question usually elicits more defensiveness and a need to explain myself, whereas the how question is more explorative in nature and also there is the tone and many more. Also, from our lab studies, we know that paraphrasing and providing, providing reflection to the speaker, summarizing what the speaker said, in the listeners words and trying to be as accurate as possible, even to use some of, to use the words that the speaker used, because the same word can mean, can have a different meaning for you and for me. But when the listener paraphrases and then asks, did they understand you, did I miss anything. Even if the listener did not, people usually can remember up to 50% of the, of what they heard. But the speaker complete— both completes this gap and feels that the listener is really trying to understand. So it signals intention. And a lot of the nonverbal behavior that signals a non-judgmental approach like Rogers argued, Carl Rogers argued, so it’s the, it’s the open body posture and it’s the leaning towards the speaker, avoiding external distractions such as looking at your smartphone or even having your smartphone, visible when you listen to someone, these are all very, very important ingredients in listening and this is for me, in a nutshell, what good listening is. I will mention however, that listening is a dyadic phenomenon. So, one, so, we know that there is high quality listening that on average will benefit most speakers, but the effectiveness of listening is really at the dyadic level, at the level of the specific listener and speaker. So, for example, I can be a terrific listener for my wife, but a horrible listener for my neighbor. Because there are very subjective perceptions depending on, on the specific listener-speaker dyad, which also needs to be taken into account when we try to define when good listening takes place.
Q. Your definition of dyadic listening?
A dyadic would be a pair of listener and the speaker.
Q. What are the conditions that facilitate good listening?
This is a good question. The conditions from the listener’s end, need to be first, a clear mind. And there, when we listen, and this is something Carl Rogers termed, the need to evaluate. People have an innate need to evaluate what they hear, an automatic need, and it is really hard to fight it. But a precondition for good listening will be to, to pick a time, a place, and a situation, where you can let your evaluative thoughts come and go. And, and not hurt the listening that you can provide. Some recommend even doing mindfulness before, in order to clear the listeners mind, but it doesn’t have to be that, it needs to be, really, it works differently for each one. But this is one key component. The other one is, I think, I call it an attitude. Because in order to listen, well, you need to decide that this is one of your priorities, because listening, and this is something that many people, when I do, when I teach listening in class, or when I do experiments in the, in the organizations or in the laboratory, they find out that they aren’t such good listeners like they thought they were. And listeners require— good listening requires an attitude that I want to decide this is something I want to prioritize, I want to be a good listener. And this is, this is a journey. Because it takes, it takes up time, it takes up energy, it takes up cognitive resources, it takes up emotional resources. So, this is also a consideration. Of course, we cannot give high quality listening in every conversation that we’re doing. But if we’re talking about high quality listening, this is an important precondition. And also, I think, a learning mindset, that, after you, you try to listen well to someone, like I said before that, you need, you need you, you want to be non-judgmental towards the speaker, you should also be non-judgmental towards yourself as a listener. After you realize that you’re not, maybe you’re not as good as— as a listener as you thought you were and have a learning mindset to think, to reflect back on the conversation. Think about points that you missed, like doors that the speaker opened for you and you didn’t come into. Places where you could have asked questions, could have provided a reflection, could have exhibited better listening behavior and learn it for your next, your next conversation or the next time you want to give high quality, you want to provide high quality listening to someone. So it’s a learning, it’s like a muscle that we need to train. Like riding a bicycle, something that we cannot just read about. Or, often people ask me, so give me like 10 tips for good listening, like I want to be, give like five in two minutes, tell me how I become a good listener. And, and I, I can name, I can name some tips. But in and of itself, they won’t make you a good listener. It’s mostly about the practice and before the attitude that this is something you really want to become.
Q. Is there an important player in the listening process, meaning the listener or the speaker or both? What’s that dynamic like?
Both the listener and the speaker are the important players in the converse— in the process. And I think that there isn’t one that is more important than the other. They are both very important, and especially, because the benefits of listening in my perception, do not come from the listener or from the speaker, but from the connection, and from the chemistry that is generated between them. It’s not something that is in, only in me as a listener or only in you as a speaker. It’s the connection that we generate, during this process of listening, that has downstream effects on the positive outcomes that we know of both for the listener and for the speakers. So I think now, after you asked it, the major player in the process is the connection. And the listener and the speaker are the generators of this force, of this force of connection. That benefits everyone, basically, in the process.
Q. In thinking about that connection, listening requires a conversation, you said that you really can’t feel understood without being listened to?
So, it is possible to feel understood without the conversation, for example, if I receive a present from my wife that I really wanted, so I can feel that she understands me, but it is not, is amorphic with listening. Because if we think about, for example, about long-term relationships, so you can know what your partner wants, and what the preferences of your partner and you can buy a great gift. And by that, arguably show understanding, but this does not mean that you have been listening to your partner in the past, I don’t know, week or a month. It could be just something that you know, from an ongoing relationship.And in my studies, with my colleagues, we’re looking at listening between strangers, mostly, most of our studies are listening between strangers, it’s called zero acquaintance diets, we bring people who do not know each other. So, there is no initial understanding of one another. And this is where, in my perception, listening is a must in order to facilitate understanding. So you don’t differentiate between, for example, long-term relationships and conversation between relative strangers.
Q. Do you need a receptive space for good listening?
Yeah, of course, you need a receptive space. It’s called psychological safety. When, and in the beginning of our conversation I men— I mentioned defensiveness, the defensiveness is often the proxy of closed mindedness and added bolstering and polarization and extremism. On the other hand, when you have an atmosphere of receptiveness, you have something called psychological safety, which means that you feel that you are free to say what you want without having, without it backfiring back at you. You also, the receptive space also includes autonomy, relatedness, a sense of relatedness. And I think all of them together in this, like all of these constructs, or mechanisms create a receptive space that allows speakers to self-explore their perspectives in a more in-depth way. And from our studies, we observe that when people are, are introspecting in a non-defensive manner, they become aware of thoughts that were less dominant before the conversation and often thought that they are even contradictory to their original thought that determined their attitude. For example, we found that good listening can make can make speaker’s attitudes more complex, less extreme, without receiving any persuasive attempt and this is a lot, this has a lot to do with the receptive space that is created between, we call it togetherness, between the listener and the speaker.
Q. On college campuses here in the US, and I’m sure Western Europe, Israel. There are places called safe spaces for conversation. Is a receptive space the same as a safe space? Have we become, too PC? Are we allowing conversation to happen in places like this, that otherwise would not happen?
Um— Yeah, but I think, so I think that having a space that is for, for, let’s say, safe conversations, is, is a good start. It will not do all the job, because the most, like the success rate depends on what actually happens in the safe spaces. So for example, I would, I would have, there is, by the way, a very interesting initiative across, they are now global, it’s called The Sidewalk Talk, when they sit listeners in the street, and just inviting people to come and talk and they listen to them. Volunteers, mainly volunteers, and this popped up to my head, because the space is important, it’s good to have, because if you have a safe space, it also means that you have less disturbances there, which we know that can, from our study that can really hurt the listening quality. But it’s not enough to say okay, so I have a safe space, now everything should be fine. And everything should work fine. People can go to your safe space and argue and bicker at each other. But if you, in the safe space you have, so let’s say you have norms, not for the content. I don’t think it’s the content. And here I think maybe, maybe it reaches the political, politically correct, that you mentioned. It doesn’t really matter what is said, but what are the norms of the behaviors that are in this place. So let’s say that we are conversing in the safe space. And now I hear something that I, you say something that I disagree with. How do I react? How do I reply? It’s very difficult, by the way to listen well to something that you disagree with, or especially strongly disagree with. And this is where I think the safe spaces are a good beginning, but I think more training for listening skills is important. Because when you talk about for example, difference of opinions, you will never get a word where, where everyone thinks the same. It doesn’t make sense, and it won’t happen. But you need to create the conditions to rise above the differences, to have a connection with is higher from my personal editor than your personal editor, that we can, we can still have opposite attitudes. But we can converse in harmony, and in a good way. And this is the type of conversations and discussion that I think we want to see more, regardless of the content that is shared. So, it’s not about what is being said, it’s about how it’s being said and received, which I think will open an avenue for more inclusion and tolerance and acceptance of one another despite the differences that will forever be between people. This is my take.
Q. I’m assuming over the decades Israelis and Palestinians have had these conversations in places that have been set up, are they working, is it successful?
So I will first say I, I am not an expert in intergroup relations. This goes to the intergroup, you need to take into consideration also power differences. So I’m, I’m taking cautious in, in my conclusions. Nevertheless, I have done a lot on listening training. So in society, we don’t see the situation getting better, we actually are seeing it getting worse, over the years. The polarization, and I think this is not only in Israel, but this is in the entire world now. What I think and what I’m trying to achieve, in my listening training, the listening training that I study, and it’s quite challenging is that we want to see the people that received the training and received the skills, serve as social agents. So for example, because you cannot train the entire world to become better listeners, it’s, maybe, hopefully, but if you’re realistic, it is very difficult. And if you have a listening training, for example, in, conducted in the safe spaces, and the safe places, where people learn how to accept one another, and how to listen well, and so they underwent, have undergone a change, which is great. But if they are the only one who benefits from the change, we didn’t do a lot. We want to see that their social circles also benefit from the improvement in their listening skills, and this is why I call them social agents. So one good listener can have a downstream effect, can like, can be contagious, for the family, for the workplace, for the community, and provide an example that then can build the process. And this is what I’m, this is a very challenging thing to study. Most of my studies so far in listening training, have focused on the people who receive the training because it’s really difficult to test their social circles. But practically, it is one of my goals to see how people who learn to become better listeners affect their community and their social circles in a way that then hopefully, we will be able to see a more accepting and peaceful discussions, and it’s not only Israelis and Palestinians, it’s Israelis and Israelis, we have so many, we have become so separated by so many aspects like never before and this is why I think that this is, this is a very, very important in tool or mechanism and a process that society needs. Because every, you can, you can look at it in society level, between ethnic groups, you can look at it in families, you can look at it in schools, you can look at it everywhere. And you will see the polarization between so many groups that are now building minor groups and minor groups and minor groups. And this is why I think listening, listening is that medicine without side effects.
Q. What is supportive listening?
Supportive listening is a lot, and is very similar to high quality listening, I don’t think that, there are many terms for listening. So for example, there is the term listening for understanding, and active listening, and high quality listening, and empathic listening, and supportive listening. And they all have the same core construct that is basically if I’m trying to, make my message simple, otherwise, you will, you will need to be listening, you will need to listen to me for many hours. They are all aimed at providing a safe space and understanding for the speaker which in turn provides support, social support, emotional support, esteem support, these are all constructs that can be facilitated by good listening in the context of conversations.
Q. Are there people who enjoy being listened to less than others?
Yes, yes, we have some evidence. For example, um, a study that I took part in together with my colleagues, Dotan Castro and Avi Kluger, and we published it in 2016. And we found that people who have what, avoidant attachment style or in simple words, fear intimacy, they gain less psychological safety, they, they are less satisfied from this high-quality listening, relative to individuals who are more secure in their attachment style. And it makes sense, theoretically, because listening is a very intimate process. And not everyone is comfortable with this intimate process, some people reach their threshold for intimacy relatively early. And then a good listener that tries to understand and to really get in their perspective might even be intimidating for them. And this is what we found that these people who are, the avoidant people who fear intimacy, they do not benefit so much from high-quality listening. These are, this is the most silent example that I can think of, I’m sure, by the way that there is a lot more. Let’s say boundary effects in terms of personality of the speakers, we have some initial evidence about people with high neuroticism that prefer less, what is called high-quality or person-centered listening. But this was a pretty exploratory study. So I’m cautious in my conclusions. But there is a lot more to study in this regard, because, as I mentioned, it has very much to do with the listener-speaker pair. And each one, so my, let’s say that I have avoidant attachment style, and you have an anxious attachment style, it will determine the fluency of our conversation. And, as if I have avoidant attachment style, and you have a secure attachment style, I’m still the same person but I, there is, a different social context. And then I can experience listening in a different way. So that there is, this is why I mentioned before that listening, it really needs to be studied at the level of the pair, of the specific pair of the listener as a speaker, because it is such a reciprocal process.
Q. What would you consider the enemy of good listening?
I would say enemies— One is fear of change.
Q. What do you think are the enemies of good listening?
So there are few enemies that we know of, of good listening. From the side of the listener, one is fear of change. And this is an argument also made by Carl Rogers, that people often fear, even without acknowledging it, or even without awareness of it, that if I really listen to you, I might have to change. And this might be threatening to me. You can see a lot, for example, in romantic relationship disputes between two people, or disputes in all sorts of levels, are a lot about the fear of change, that if I really listen to you, I might realize that you are correct, and I might need to revisit my perspectives and change myself. And this is, this is a lot to take. So, this is one enemy, fear of change. The other one is loss of power. Good listeners are perceived as less dominant by their speaker. So they lose dominance, which is social status, but they gain a different form of social status, which is prestige. So, but not everyone is willing to do this tradeoff between power and prestige. So, if a listener is high on the value for power, there is a good chance that they will not be able to listen well because they might fear that if they are not heard, and if they give the space to another person, they will lose their social status. So this is another enemy, the loss of dominance, to certain people, not to everyone it depends on personality characteristics. Another enemy is secondary trauma. There is a term called compassion fatigue. For example, social workers and people, psychologists, clinical psychologists, often sometimes experience when you listen to difficult information, it’s, it’s contagious. So it, when you listen to difficult stories and even traumatic stories, it might also bring back some memories that you wish you would forget or you wish would be outside of your awareness. And this is like a secondhand trauma, that you receive the trauma of the speaker, and it can cause emotional costs for the listener. It doesn’t happen often because it is a very specific circumstance when a person shares a very difficult story, but it does happen. So this is another enemy. Fear of intimacy is an enemy that I mentioned. And one, one interesting is, two more if I may. One is the lack of story. In one of my studies, with my colleagues, we found that people, that listeners, find it easier to listen when the speaker is telling a story, versus telling facts or descriptions. This has to do with the how you, how the speaker, frames the content. So for example, listening to boring information. Or if you have someone, if you listen to a lecture or a talk, and the speaker is very boring and doesn’t provide any examples or stories, it might be difficult to listen. So lack of story is another. I’m not saying people have to, if I ask if you asked me for directions, how to get to the university, and he started to tell you a story, you will probably drive, drive away because you think I’m crazy. So you don’t have to tell stories all the time. But it is something that helps if you want people to listen to you. And, the last one is time. Listening, as I mentioned, it requires time and effort. And these are limited resources. This is the resources that we equate with money, time equals money, energy equals money. And not every time we have the willingness, or the preference, to give this important resource of listening, of the time and energy that listening consumes, to the person that asks for it. So this is another enemy, that we have limited energy and time.
Q. Listening in the workplace, are there tools to use in the workplace to encourage better listening?
Yeah, Yes, they are, there are quite a few. Firstly, I think it’s very important for organizations to implement listening training. And I’ve been studying it for the last six years. And we are seeing tremendous effects on the connection that it facilitates between employees and on reducing burnout and anxiety and increasing relatedness. And again, it is a skill. There is, but there are some easy to implement techniques that I can think of, for example, there is something called checking in. And there was an interesting study that found that checking in is rated by employees is more important than other aspects of the workplace that people think are much more important for us, such as being invited to an important meeting, meeting and, and etc. and checking in is merely, is spending a few minutes with a colleague asking so, Richard, how are you, how do you feel. Asking, really taking interest for a few minutes a day in one calling. And this is a test by the way I give to my students when I teach them in my listening course, that you, each day for the next week, you need to learn something new about a colleague at work. And when you perceive that the other person is interesting or has something interesting to say, it will be easier for you to listen. And also your colleagues will reciprocate. If you check in with them, if you really, listen to them, give them the attention and, and try to understand them, converse with them beyond this, the regular work, related conversations are simple. How are you, is everything going well, is anything new, something a bit deeper than our everyday conversations, they will also reciprocate back to you. And you will be, you will— you will build a good working relationship. And so there are also more interesting, also in the way that people are, the workplaces are giving feedback. By the way, feedback also, I— I’ve been teaching it for more than 10 years, every organization is doing it. But there is a study conducted more than about 25 years ago in 1996, by my PhD advisor, Avi Kluger, that found that in 40% of the cases, feedback hurts performance. And the mechanism is similar to what we discussed before, it’s the defensiveness, the self-threat. People do not like being told something about themselves and they become defensive. And there are actually techniques that organization can implement, such as, for example, a technique called the feet forward, when you will really, it’s an interview protocol, that, that you, you listen well, and you want to take the insights from the employee, from the interviewee, that can remedy some of the pitfalls of feedback. So there is a lot to do in the workplace in this regard.
Q. Listening to your children?
It’s a tricky question. So I have three girls. My little one tomorrow turns four. I have a seven year old and my older one is almost nine. And they can feel for example, when we go down to the park, if I’m not really listening to them. So I remember one example that I was texting while I was with my, with my middle daughter in the playground, and she told me, Daddy, I want to go home. And then I stopped. And I put that phone in my pocket and gave her only her, I gave my attention solely to her. And I asked her a few minutes later, do you still want to go home, she said no. And it’s very difficult. Because, and I’m speculating a bit here, we’ve done some work on listening to other lessons. And there is a great book called How to Listen so Children will Speak and How to Speak so Children will Listen, by I think two authors named Faber, Mazlish are their last names. I think it’s difficult because you cannot be in, I won’t say you, cannot be an actor when you’re home because you spend a lot of time with your kids. And a lot of time, you can take it for granted that if I’m, especially nowadays without the disturbances of technology, if I’m in the same place with them, it means that I’m with them. It does not, they do not, they do not grasp it in the same way. For them, if you’re, for a child, even by the way, for a romantic partner, it’s better to really be with them without disturbances and giving full attention for 30 minutes, then being with them for two hours, but doing everything else, using you know, playing with your smartphone and going online and the thing we know that we are doing, because we will now like addicted to all the technology that is all around us. And often it makes kids feel that it doesn’t matter. You can be with them for six hours, but you’re not really with them. And so I think it’s in terms of quality versus quantity. But it is difficult, it is challenging. Because these are the people that you spend most of your time with and, and we are human, we make mistakes. But I think the key is and I talked about the learning mindset is to learn from your mistakes. Like as a father, they’re, my children are the most important thing in the world to me. And I, in order to be a good father, I’m trying, I'm not saying I’m successful at it, but to learn from the mistakes I make in order to, for like, the example I gave you. So now I try to not use my phone when they go and play with them. And my girls are also very direct. They will now tell me, Daddy, take away your phone or they will take, they will take it from me. But it’s the attention that you give, people want the attention, they want, when you give someone attention, they feel that they matter. They feel that they are important. So this is where I think, a lot of time where we miss the central point. It’s not the how much time I can be, I can be all day at home, but I wasn’t with them. This is a very important difference in this regard.
Q. How does technology impact listening for the good and for the bad?
So I will start with for the bad. We’ve done a study a few years ago, where we brought speakers and listeners to the laboratory and behind the speaker, we put a few, they were located, already there in our lab, computer screens, and we programmed them to flicker really quickly in the, in the white and black. So you cannot, you could not maintain constant eye contact with your speaker. So like if now I’m speaking you’re listening to me, you will behind my back, you will see flickering computer screens. But you can equate it with listening to someone when you have your favorite show on TV on the playing on the back. And we found pretty robust effects in how anxious the speakers felt. And they felt that they were less clear in the message that they conveyed when they conversed with a distracted listener. We also did an experiment where we told half, we randomly assigned half of the listeners to, without their smartphones, and half of the listeners with their smartphones, and they converse with their speakers for 12 minutes. And for the listeners in the distracted condition, we texted, we bought this, you know, automatic softwares, the software when you can message many people simultaneously. So each 90 seconds, we texted them, and they knew they had to, they had to answer it, a brief question. For example, what did you have for lunch today? What did you have for lunch today? Would you, what are your plans for tonight, would you recommend this course to a friend? And we told them to answer really briefly. And we also saw a very big difference in the listener perception from this, their speakers. So technology can really hurt the quality of listening because we’re also now accustomed to doing everything quick and fast. And you know, we were like, we were on the fifth gear, constantly. And listening requires slowing down a bit, which I think, I think this sometimes collides with technology that we want everything fast and quick. And so this is on, on the harmful side. On the positive side, I think that the chronology opened an avenue, for example, I will give you an example. Since— since the pandemic almost a year and a half ago, I had to close my laboratory because we cannot do in-person experiments. So we moved all our experiments to the Zoom platform. And we created a listening protocol and logistic protocol, and we trained our listeners, and we found similar even stronger effects when listening through computer-mediated communication.So it does give us an opportunity. So now you’re in the US and I’m in Israel. And we’re conversing, and I feel like you’re sitting in front of me. I think this is a very big advantage that technology gave us, the opportunity to connect and converse across the globe, in our interdependent world, and we need to know how to use it wisely.
Q. Police training, how listening could help the cop on the beat?
I think in, in this context, it is, we have, by the way, my colleague Netta, who you will also interview, is doing a project on training police. And I think part of it will be hopefully devoted to listening. She might have more to say about it, but in the way that I see it, we know that, from our studies that listening can reduce speakers' prejudice, attitudes. We found it, and we published a paper about it last year. It is very difficult to listen to someone that you hold a stereotyped attitude towards. Think of it even, you mentioned in your question, the police. Think even about job interviews, when someone comes to you, and he looks in a certain way that is different from you, or in a way that you do not like so much. You have automatic judgments in your head towards this person. And, this makes it really difficult for people who are untrained to really listen, because you can, because you start the conversation. I will be cautious and say on average, on average, what we see is that people start the conversation with predetermined attitudes about who the other person is, or what the other person did before they converse with him. And this can really make listening difficult when you have so many prior stereotypes towards people. So you mentioned in your question the police, this is certainly relevant. And I come from a business administration. So exam, in the workplace, it is also, think about even like an investor with a customer or hiring decision, or— it’s really difficult. And this is again about how can we overcome our own biases. And I think the first step is becoming aware of it. Because if you talk to the average person, people will not tell you that they have biases, we see it for many of our studies, like a lot of the answers are, I do not have biases against any group. But then, then when the conversation goes on and on you see that there is, there are biases towards certain groups. And the first step would be acknowledging it, like so, you know, acknowledging the problem is the first step to try to solve it. So it’s challenging, but I think that in order to be more connected, because we are connected now, as a society, but now we are connected in a bad way, we are, we live in an interdependent world, and, and in all aspects. And in order to make this now, let’s not say bad connection, but are lacking or a lack, the lack of connection that we live in, we need to know how we can listen, even not cancel out our biases, but listening beyond our biases, that they will see the person behind the stereotype that I have. And this requires training. This requires, this is a skill. And this is a process. I cannot, it’s like, it’s like I can tell you, Richard, trust me, will you trust me? I need to provide you with examples, right, I need to show you that you can really trust me. And I think the same goes when, when you want to train people to listen, for example, police, police officers or, or everyone, or teachers, or managers. You want to train them to, teach them to listen beyond their biases. They need to see examples. And they think that the more that they will feel listened to, the more they will listen to back to other people.
Q. Political tribalism. How do you think listening begins to reduce polarization? The Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa? How do you begin to reduce that tribalism through better listening?
This is a difficult question, because there is no easy answer, but it is doable. And I think first, as I mentioned before, is to acknowledge that people are different. And in order to, and I’m saying it, because Netta and I have an ongoing project about listening in disagreements, in the context of disagreements. And it’s a project we just started. But we, you want, you don’t need to make everyone the same. So if you’re on one side of the political map, and I’m on the other side of the political map, the resolution will not be that we were on the same side of the political map, it will be that we accept, and we can get along, even if we differ in attitude that are very self-defining. And, I think that, so first, I think it’s the acknowledgement that we need, it’s okay that we’re different. But we need to find what is, what is not similar, but what keeps us together, rather than separates us. And then I think it’s creating places for good listening to take place. So you mentioned the safe places for conversation on the campuses, I think that the, like on the practical side, the more, and I’m looking at from like a practical agenda, the more places that will be, that will allow a both— conversation, safe conversations, using storytelling, there are many, many, many tools, but you need to create the environment for it. It will not happen when you, when you and I are standing in line and then you’re trying to get past me and I’m trying to get past you, it will not happen there. It can happen if we create places where people can, can experience it and can practice it. And there I think, I think it’s a start, in order to then, to learn that we can accept each other, even despite holding different important for us points of view that are important to us. But you know, at the end of the day, everyone wants to be happy. Everyone wants to live in a peaceful world, everyone wants to raise their children in a better world, Will one be a person that tells you that no, I’m against it, I’m against a peaceful and, and good relationships. And that, we need the structures. And the tools. And I think listening is one of them, is a major one of them. But you need to create the environment for listening to happen. Otherwise, we just see more and more polarization everywhere we look.
Q. We live in a post-truth, post-fact society. How can you listen if you can’t even agree on what the facts are?
It’s a tricky question.
Q. We can’t even agree what happened January 6th. How do you listen to someone on that score? The pandemic… So how do you listen to someone like that, and try to get to a safe place or a place where you can agree to disagree?
Yeah, I think this, like, which fact is correct, you know, two people can look at the same, the same phenomena and perceive it completely differently. And I’m not talking, it doesn’t matter now, who is right and who is wrong, the question is, what is your goal, when conversing with the person. If your goal is to, you gave an example from your, for your, from your neighbor, if your goal is to change your neighbor’s attitude, and to persuade your neighbor that this is not as, as he thinks, this is a different process. And, but I don’t think by the way, that when we talk about this post-true era, as you mentioned it, I don’t even think it is worth the effort. Because everyone or even are, are reading different resources and watching different resources. So like, you can live, you live next to your neighbor, but you live in a completely different world. You see differently, you watch the news on a different channel, you read different newspapers. So you live in a parallel world. I think the question is not— like you need to ask yourself, in order to have good— in order to have good relationship with this person, do— is it so important, we agree on this topic. And sometimes you might relate that you can live, you can agree to disagree, I think like this, and you think like that, but let’s, let’s talk about something that unites us, rather than what separates us, because we can spend our entire life, and we are doing it, by the way, conversing and arguing and disputing about everything that separates between us, and it will never end. And we see that as the world becomes more and more uncertain, we see the gaps are growing and growing and growing. I think instead, we need to change the nature, not the kind that we can talk about things that we disagree with. It's okay. But it’s how we talk about it. And to add conversation about stuff that is above, that unites us above, above the differences. Does it really matter if I think like this, and you think like that, that doesn’t mean we can’t be friends. Unfortunately, now it happens. Now people are not talking to each other because of different perspectives and different, various additives that matter to them. And we know it happens. And we cannot, I think in my view, we cannot fight it directly by changing everyone’s— and have everyone listen and hear the same sources. And then everyone, have everyone think the same. But to have people connect, be up above the differences. So it’s okay that you and your neighbor don’t think this way. But at the end of the day, you want to get along with your neighbor, because it determines your well-being and your quality of life. So the question is, if you’re willing to make an effort, and this is an effort, as we all know, to sometimes listen to stuff, you disagree and say, okay, I, and to yourself, I disagree, but I give this person the autonomy and the freedom to express what they think and then you will see that on most cases they will reciprocate to you. Whereas when you argue you usually get, you know what you get back. But if we try to give the safe space, and this is, this is, by the way, also a misconception people often make, good listening does not equal agreeing with the speaker. And it’s about, it’s about the positivity resonance. It’s about the, it’s about the non-judgmental attitude towards one’s freedom to express the attitudes. And I think this is where we need to invest our effort, not to have everyone think the same because we know it won’t work and we know that we’ll see more and more and more separation everywhere we look. But to, to allow, to allow this conversation to happen without, without trying to challenge the others attitude, if we know that we have no chance. There are, by the way, a lot of very, very effective persuasion techniques. But this is for a different conversation. Now we’re talking in the context of listening. And this is acknowledging that in order to listen well you do not have to agree with the person. But again, it takes energy. It takes energy and we all know it.
Q. Is there a science of listening?
This is what we’re trying to do. We’re trying to, we are, we are at the university, we’re doing laboratory experiments. We’re doing field experiments. So now listening, and I think, as the years progress, fortunately, listening is getting more and more attention. As I remember when I started graduate school, in a business school, you know, when you’re in a business school people expect you to— when they ask you. So what is your topic? They expect stuff like I am studying strategy, finance, motivation, marketing. I said, I study listening. You study listening in the business school, didn’t you get confused between the communication department and clinical psych and social work. And now, and truthfully, in the beginning, when, when they had little research experience, I was a bit embarrassed to say in, in the context of the business school that I study listening. Nowadays, when we know all the, so many effects of listening, I’m very confident in saying, I study listening. So I think we are doing, we are, listening is getting more and more attention in different domains. And we are progressing toward, there is a lot more to do, of course, but we are progressing towards the science of listening. This is basically what we’re trying to do.
Q. Is listening related to humility?
Listening is— I think it relates both to the, I will take a specific construct in, which is called intellectual humility. Because we have an ongoing project on this construct and intellectual humility, and this is by the way, it relates to your previous question on, how do I listen to someone I disagree with. And intellectual humility, a construct coined by a Professor Mark Clary, from Duke University, is about acknowledging that your perspectives might not be the only correct ones, that there are more complexity and different sides to the topic. And we have an ongoing project when we see, we have some initial evidence that when people feel listened to, they become more intellectually humble. So they realize that their initial perspective might not be the only correct one. And also the listeners, when I listen really well to someone, my intellectual humility also increases because I’m allowing myself to let the thoughts of another person come into my mind. And if I’m not blocking it by trying to think of how I’m responding to you or how I justify myself, really trying to take your perspective. As evidence we see in our, now our first studies about it, that it increases the listener’s intellectual humility, and also in my earlier work, we st— I studied the construct of attitude ambivalence, which is about the coexistence of both positive and negative aspects in an attitude. So for example, you can, you can dislike your neighbor because of his perspective on vaccines. But you can also like him, for always, for helping you when you’re in times of need. So, you will be, you have both the present— presence of opposite aspects within an attitude. And we found that when speakers are experienced, when speakers experience good listening, they become aware of the other aspects within their attitude resulting in more ambivalence. But on, but at the same time, this ambivalence does not result in an aversive neg— aversive feeling, but they can tolerate their ambivalence. And we call this paper by the way, I’m aware of my inconsistencies, but I can tolerate it, the effect of high quality listening on speaker’s attitude ambivalence. And this is I think it, it relates to humility, because part of humility is acknowledging that there are other sights, that there is a multiplicity and complexity in, in, in my attitude, for example.
Q. Does listening matter if we already agree?
Yes. I think the question is, again, what is your goal? So let me ask you back. Think of someone who’s really meaningful to you. For example, give me an example. (MY WIFE) Your wife, great. Let’s, let’s take a— now you and your wife are conversing about a topic that you agree on. Will it be good for you to listen well to her? (ABSOLUTELY) So listening, listening is not about, some of it, there are implications. And we’ve been studying it for creating harmony during disagreement, this is like my focal project right now. But it is not, it is one of our most frequent behaviors during the day. So it is relevant everywhere, when you listen to your wife, when she wants to share something with you, or when we listen to friends or even to strangers, it’s all around us. So because this behavior is so prevalent, it matters, and it matters a lot.
Q. Where people really try to listen deeply and genuinely to others, what’s the impact on human flourishing? The impact of the Templeton World Charity Foundation Award on what you’re studying?
Yes, so we are really grateful for the generous grant from the Templeton Foundation. And it really, it made it possible for us to, we are starting the research pretty soon that we’re supposed to start in August, to look into, for example, one of our goals is to build a protocol of listening that can be implemented by worldwide, by, by many people in order to create, in order to create a better world, and this is something that we would not be able to do if it weren’t for the, for the generous grant from the Templeton World Charity Foundation. And it also enables us to further and basically to, to provide a robust examination for our projects about, for our project about listening during disagreements. And both from the side of the speaker and for the side of the listener. And we’re trying now to make it more, we call it in science, you ask about the science of listening. So it’s called ecological validity. We were trying to build, create situations that mirror daily interactions and, and not something artificial, that you say, okay, you found this effect in your lab, but in real life, it works differently. So Netta Weinstein and I, Netta, my colleague on this grant, we’re trying to look at conversations that tip as close as possible to practical real world situations that will provide ecologically valid results, that we can then generalize it to many other aspects during, of listening, and especially during disagreement in order to reduce polarization.
Q. What sort of innovations do you see will make a difference in this field?
I think— you saved the toughest question for the last. I have so many ideas in this regard. But I think one of them you ask about technology, so one of them is using technology in the service of listening. We’re now trying to conduct a study using, for example, using robots who listen, we want to see if a robot listener can give the same similar benefit to a human listener. Just a project in the very, very beginning, but this is one avenue. Another avenue I think is to examine what happens neurologically in the brain, when people experience good listening, in order to really tap into the processes. This is on the more, on the theoretical side and on the practical side, I would want to see and conduct more pract— more listening intervention in the, in the quotation real world. Between where people really disagree, not only when we bring them to the laboratory in the university, but in the workplace and in, on the streets and on debates and you know, we have so many opportunities, my research dream is to have like a large intervention, training people for listening, and then measure the, the reciprocal, like, how are we to reciprocate to, to other, to their, to their social circles, as I mentioned before, in order to really make a change.
Q. Give me a couple of tips for good listening? How do you teach people to listen?
So teaching, I will give you tips, tips— the first tip would be to take a listening training but the tips for quick implementation, first avoid any external disturbances that you have when you really want to listen to someone, for…
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Q. Tips for good listening?
One tip is to avoid external disturbances, such as for example, your smart phone. We often think that when, if we put our phone on vibrate, or on silent mode, that it won’t disturb us when we listen, this is not true. And as I mentioned at the beginning of our conversation, the speaker often, every few seconds, turn their gaze back to the speaker, listener, sorry, and when they see that you’re—
So, when, when you have your smart phone next to you, you will be tempted to look when you receive a message, and when you receive a phone call, there are, by the way, there are brain studies showing, that when, that we’re addicted to our smartphones, so don’t think you’re stronger than it and avoid this external disturbances. To— try— when you listen, try to think of questions that will benefit your speaker, rather than your curiosity. Try to think to put yourself in the speakers shoes and think what do they want, would want, to learn about themselves and help them, using questions, paraphrase is very important, don’t worry that you will not summarize their content correctly, because even if you miss, and you will miss, because we remember about 50% of what we hear. But first you signal that you really want to understand, second the speaker will complete the gaps, making it easier for you to listen, as the conversation unfolds. Another one is, after the conversation, think about the opportunities that you missed. Often in conversations, the speaker opens the listener like a small door, to come in and to, to find out new information, or help the speaker find out new information about themselves. Think about missed opportunities that you had during these — like a self-reflection if you, as, as a listener, and um, I think the— try to learn something new, from, once-a-day, pick a conversation, even an ordinary conversation. And say like, I want to learn something new about this person. And you see that this by itself will make you listen better, when you want to find out something. You will listen better because you have an interest, you’re like forcing yourself for an interest, but you will, it can become more habitual as you practice it more. And ask— don’t be afraid to, to ask the speaker to repeat themselves. We often think that wow, if I will tell you, Richard, can you please say it again, I was distracted, you will perceive me as a poor listener, and this is not the case. The opposite is correct. If I pretend that I still understand you and I’m still listening to you, you will realize that I’m not really listening to you and not really understanding you, so don’t be afraid to ask for clarification and to ask speakers to repeat what they say when you missed it, it’s ok, it is authentic and you will be appreciated for it.
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