Whose fault is it when someone interrupts?

Are you someone who hates the sound of silence? Some people find silences very troublesome and can’t resist the urge to fill pauses with rather than sit them out and wait to see what’s coming next. Others prefer to sit back and listen before adding to a conversation. But what happens when these two conversational styles clash?

The answer is pretty simple. Without some mechanisms in place to ensure both sides of the conversation get a fair hearing and a healthy dose of mutual respect, the person doing all the talking is likely to dominate the conversation. This often means having one person talk over the other.

Now it would be easy to just point the finger of blame at certain personality stereotypes. After all, we’ve all experienced those workplace situations when people are talking over each other. Research suggests it is women who are most often on the receiving end of this sleight and that culprits tend to be men manterrupting. However, a 2014 study also suggests that women are more likely to interrupt other women than they are to interrupt their male peers.

Before I look at devices that can be used to counter interruption, it’s interesting to point out a  linguistic angle which feeds into this discussion on interruption. This indicates that the person butting in may not always be trying to undermine you. They just can’t help it.

This is because the way we conduct our conversations sits between two poles – high-involvement and high-considerateness and it is suggested that our personal conversational style is formulated in childhood.

Are you someone who likes to lead a conversation, talks quickly and has a problem with silences? Your conversational style leans towards high involvement. Or are you someone who listens intently, isn’t afraid of pauses and waits for someone to finish before adding your own words? If so, then your style is high considerateness.

To give an example, a good friend of mine recounts how she grew up as the middle child of five siblings. She talks a lot and blames her conversational style on having to fight to be heard. She can (and does) interrupt frequently during conversations because of this deep seated exuberance to push the conversation along. It is sometimes annoying, but it isn’t malicious intent to control the conversation. In fact it’s often misguided enthusiasm.

Inevitably some people sit at the extremes, but most of us have a place in between the two extremes. In a situation when you are trying to make yourself heard the psychological impact of being interrupted is significant. It not only drains confidence and undermines you personally, but it can also lead to a perception in the room that you are being undermined.

So how to deal with them? Kamala Harris provided some great examples around how to effectively deal with interruptions on her campaign trail. She has spent her career fending off interruptions – mostly by men it has be said – and she has learned the power of eye contact and body language to communicate poise and power, without having to revert to turning up her own volume.

The lesson she teaches is that if someone interrupts, do not look elsewhere and shrink, but counter with a ‘look’ that means business. She also effectively uses body language to rebuff an interruption (her go-to is either an extended ‘stop’ palm or an upheld finger). But when encountering particularly boorish interruptions, she isn’t afraid to counter back verbally, but note how she always does so with a smile..

Another tip for dealing with interruption is to combine body language – use the hand, the gaze, the smile – but continue talking in the face of interruption, but with a slightly quickened pace. Why? You have the momentum and the interrupter has to work much harder to impose themselves. By pushing ahead aggressively with an interruption, they expose themselves by their actions in front of others.

However, this device also counters a badly judged or unintended interruption from a high involvement conversationalist. It allows their over enthusiasm to recede and you will often notice how the interrupter takes a rather awkward gulp or shuffle as they realise they have misplayed the situation. In these situations, it is always good protocol to finish your point and then come back to them and ask what they wanted to say.

My final point on this is to say that if you are frequently interrupted, by different people, then it might be a good idea to take a look at your own speaking style and to consider if this is contributing. For example, are you repeating a point already made, are you delivering concise information and valid points?

The important thing to remember is that conversation is an interactive process. As well as focusing on the other person, it’s always prudent to keep an open mind about our own contribution to conversations and how to improve our engagement. The learning process never stops regardless of whether you speak because you have to say something or because you have something to say.