As anyone who’s ever been on a date knows, nothing is worse than that awkward silence when neither one of you can think of anything to say. It’s hard to strike up a lively conversation with someone you don’t know very well, particularly if you’re nervous, or have other things on your mind. However, conversation, and particularly dating conversation, is a skill that can be learned, and once mastered, is extremely impressive to your partner.
Since you’re usually just getting to know someone on a date, the conversation tends to be composed of a lot of questions, which is a good method when used properly. Most of the time, it’s not what you ask, it’s how you ask that matters. However, they simply ask the questions in a way that actually discourages conversation. The most common culprits here are yes or no questions. “Is your meal good?” “Yes.” “Do you like classical music?” “No.” If you ask a dead end question, you will get a dead end answer, which doesn’t do the conversation a bit of good and can end up making the date into a ping pong match of yeses and no’s, which is awkward by anyone’s standards, and doesn’t help you to get to know the person at all. A similar problem occurs when you ask one word questions, such as what their favorite color is, or what their job is.
Rather than asking yes or no questions, or questions with one word answers, you should ask get to know you questions. These are questions with a little depth, and will let you know much more about your partner than the information that you could find on their facebook page anyway. These questions don’t always come naturally, so you should think of a few before the date, and practice asking them so that they sound natural. Once you get more accustomed to asking these types of questions, you’ll be able to do it on the fly and not have to practice so much, but in the beginning, come prepared.
Questions that will get you the answers you really want are those that invite discussion, opinion, or history. Think like a journalist, and ask the five “W’s”: who, what, when, where, why. Rather than asking if they like classical music, ask, “Who is your favorite composer — and why?” These types of questions tend to build on themselves, and are also a good way out if you get stuck trading yeses and no’s. Best of all, you come away actually knowing something personal about your partner, and you demonstrate that you are a good listener by registering their responses and building further conversation off of that.
Although it does take a little bit of preparation and practice, by having several getting to know you questions of this type, your dating conversational skills can’t help but improve. Dead end questions make for dead end dates, but questions that help you get to know the other person leave them impressed — and wanting more.
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