- Step away from your phone: the new rules of conversation
- “phubbing”. According to Sherry Turkle, the American sociologist of digital life, this involves maintaining eye contact with one person while text-messaging another.
- Turkle’s thesis, in short, rings troublingly true: we’re more connected than ever, yet we talk – really talk – less and less
- How to talk to anyone: the experts' guide
- It can help to make your questions more specific
- Try to meet your child’s emotions, rather than telling them how to feel
- Teenagers often respond better if you’re doing something alongside a conversation, so they don’t have to give you a lot of eye contact
- Using a bit of humour can help to defuse the tension
- “The roof is an introduction”, which means that if you’re in the same place, you always have something in common.
- It’s becoming more common for children to feel in competition with their parents
- Eight writers on the conversation that changed their life
