Someone asked this on Quora: “I learn very quickly by asking questions. Is it acceptable to interrupt someone during a conversation to gain more clarity on a topic?” Which I relate to a lot.
Someone answered this: “Yes , it is very rude to do because maybe on a little further into conversation your question may be answered and if not then , make a mental note of it and as soon as you see an opening in the conversation - circle back to the point in the where your question fits in and ask it . Interupting someon while they are talking can cause that person to lose sight of they were want say and what thier point was going to be .”
But this doesn’t seem to always work for me, and I must say it depends on the person you’re talking to and the situation.
- Sometimes if someone misunderstands something you said or that has happened or gets a fact wrong, they can end up going on a pointless/misguided tangent in the conversation and even can start getting progressively angrier on their own without you even saying anything, whereas if you interrupt and clarify the misunderstanding that can help to calm them down in certain cases, and to course-correct the conversation to make it more productive and reasonable.
- Sometimes they never allow you a chance to speak at all, talk for ages on their own, and then simply exit the conversation before you would have any ability to respond to specific things they said earlier.
- If they say so many things you want to respond to, it can add up to a lot, and you may not be able to ever get through them if you can’t respond to them as they come up.
- Making a mental note is often impossible for me, I frequently forget and need to address something immediately in order to remember it, unless I can pause the conversation to make a physical or digital note (can’t focus on what they’re saying while writing it) which people would probably find even more rude either way.
I’ve also seen lots of debaters, journalists and interviewers interrupting people as their standard method or style of dialogue, and it seems to work for them (sometimes people get annoyed at them, sometimes they don’t and often do the same thing), so I don’t know.
I would appreciate if anyone has any literature on why it may be acceptable to interrupt sometimes or perhaps a recognised style of communication that allows this, as well as any speakers who defend this practice and debates about the topic itself.
Thanks
It’s cultural. I’ve experienced many times accidentally making others uncomfortable with my silence during a conversation. That specific phenomena is known in linguistics as backchanneling (see also: the Japanese art of aizuchi)
Much like backchanneling, some cultures demand interruptions while others look down upon it. It’s important that we don’t overly invest ourselves in the virtues or lack thereof lest we accidentally wander into the territory of cultural imperialism. Sometimes things are the way they are just because and you have to roll with it as best you can.
Making a mental note is often impossible for me, I frequently forget and need to address something immediately in order to remember it, unless I can pause the conversation to make a physical or digital note (can’t focus on what they’re saying while writing it) which people would probably find even more rude either way.
I sympathize as a person with (catastrophic) ADHD. Trying to hold in a thought feels like smothering it. The concept of a “mental note” feels like some sort of cruel joke – my working memory is 6 words long and people expect me to somehow hold a question in there without tuning out the rest of the conversation? Agonizing!
Even so, I try (and frequently fail) to behave as expected. I find that most people can come to appreciate the effort once they get to know you and your shortcomings. Never forget that people are not monuments; if you mean well and try your best others will bend the rules for you.
I didn’t knew it was culturally dependent, but thank you for sharing! It is very interesting.
I don’t know how to deal with it with 99% of people, but between my wife and I we have a system. When someone is talking and the other has a response they want to say to something, they hold up their finger. The speaker then wraps up their thought and gives the other person room to speak. It isn’t foolproof but it helps a lot. We both have the problems you’re describing otherwise / we still have those problems, but it’s better than otherwise.
In a social convo I’d make a similar gesture with my hands / fingers. Hard to describe, but something like I’ve just woken up and I must say something right now? Kind of motion.
Then I’ll apologise then quickly ask the question.
I think interruption is often based on assumption and a good conversationalist or debater wouldn’t want to rely on assumption.
Also, how do you feel about being interrupted or spoken over?
Some people talk out loud to organise their thoughts. I think it’s best to let them have the space, unless there’s something urgent or time critical going on.
Then there’s a question of language. In English it’s easier to make those assumptions, but in German it is trickier due to sentence structure. Sometimes you need to wait to make sense of what is being said.
Here’s a nice explanation of the types and reasons for interrupting:
https://www.psychmechanics.com/psychology-of-interrupting/
You’ll see that there’s one called rapport interrupting, which I think most people do, not as a power move, but to show empathy.
If someone is clearly violating an agreed-upon boundary or its of an offensive tenor that is abusive, I’ll either stop them as soon as that is apparent or I’ll just leave.
People feel around and test boundaries all the time and its up to you to set your own personal standards and then back them up consistently so there isn’t deviation from the basics
Just like most human interaction, it’s situational and the rules to how to do it are very context based as well. There are proper ways, and acceptable reasons to interrupt in specific scenarios. In formal structured settings it leans on almost always inappropriate. On informal and intimate exchanges it’s perfectly acceptable but rules to how, when, to whom and why are nuanced and unwritten. Every social group will have their own by laws as well. Observe any human gathering and you will notice them interrupting each other all the time. Ask those same people whether it’s acceptable to interrupt others and they will naïvely mostly answer that it isn’t. Thus is the nature of human communication.
You have stumbled onto one of lives true mysteries, i an unsure if wel ever know the answer.
On a very serious note, every point you made I encounter all the time, people going on misguided tangents, mental notes getting chaotic quickly…
Worst is when i do get to ask a question but its interpreted as a different question so now i get a long answer for something i didn’t ask and often info i already knew.
The catch is i know why I encounter this all the time and that’s because i am certified Add/autist…
What that means for you i have no clue, only real advice i have (for professional setting) is make it clear you want important information in writing.
Writings can be read om your own time, can be thought trough, easily circle back and forth to summarize a list of questions you still have at the end which can simply be mailed back.
It doesn’t solve the live social dynamic but effectively circumvents it if coworkers acknowledge that miscommunication causes routine issues.
Interrupting is the crude mode of operations. If time isn’t an issue, and the other person is understood to be trying to say something, I never interrupt someone. If a statement or question is “dumb”, I give the benefit of the doubt, because it doesn’t take away from there being an answer. If it’s a loaded one or uses a literary device, I have no issue deconstructing it. As for if it’s an attack on me, would interrupting help?
Also going on faith that they might answer your question on their own without you even asking it, seems unreliable to me and often it’s very unlikely or even impossible that they would unless you ask them yourself, depending on the context.
If you’re in a one on one conversation with another person where the intention of both parties is for you to learn something from them, the idea that you should just sit and wait and hope is silly at best and actively detrimental at worst.
You do want to avoid interrupting at awkward moments so you don’t make them forget what they’re saying or irritate them with a question they are going to answer in the next two words. But it’s pretty simple to avoid those (or more importantly, to demonstrate to the other person that you are INTENDING to avoid them, even if you make mistakes). Three big things:
- Pay attention to tone of voice, including speed and volume. People will usually slow down, soften their voice, and shift their pitch off neutral (raising or lowering) to sort of “open the floor” for constructive interruptions without outright stopping. That’s the ideal spot to jump in.
- Be practical about the content of what’s being said. If you have a question about one thing but you see that your partner is clearly moving on to a totally new thing - interrupt them. Even if you do have to be pretty abrupt with it, this is still a “constructive interruption” because it helps both speakers stay on the same page and have an efficient interaction.
- Backchannel your intentions. Someone else mentioned that backchanneling include minor interruptions — things like nodding, saying “oh wow,” “yeah totally” — that don’t actually take the floor away (the other person doesn’t have to stop talking to give you space). Another kind of backchanneling is using small soft vocal signals (“hmmm” “oh uh well…”) to give the other person the chance to stop and let you ask a question. You don’t force your way in; they can finish their thought but see that they shouldn’t move on yet. Aside from soft vocalizations, these kinds of cues also include laughter, facial expressions (puzzled, skeptical, surprised, etc), eye gaze (either suddenly looking away or suddenly looking right at the person), and gestures (tilting your head to one side, doing a “mouth shrug,”
I study conversational gestures and backchannel a for a living, so I’ll add that my personal favorite tool here is a modified shrug. Tilt your head a little, extend your upturned hand or pointed finger out toward them (but like, softly and not at or near their face, just in neutral space), maybe raise one shoulder a little optionally, and just hold it there. They will read it as a request to metaphorically pass the turn to you the same way they’d pass you the salt.
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