Don’t sweat it if you’re not good at remembering things, including names. “A person’s name is to that person the sweetest and most important sound in any language,” Dale Carnegie wrote in his 1937 ...

Learning how to get better at small talk might not seem like much of a conversational superpower. Arguably everyone’s least favorite part of socializing, surface-level chitchat can be awkward, ...

For many people, small talk is not their favorite activity, but everyone engages in it at some point. When meeting new people, small talk is used as an icebreaker for conversation. It’s an interaction ...

Small talk often gets a bad rap. It can feel awkward, superficial and pointless at times — if you're doing it wrong. But it's one of the most powerful tools in your arsenal to build relationships, ...

I’m not particularly close with my brother. We have an age gap of six years, after all. I left for college when he was still in middle school, so he was an only child for most of his ...

For some people, having to make small talk is a uniquely horrifying mode of torment. If this is true for you, it’s likely that you can recall in grim detail your last attempts to find a way to make ...

I know I’m not alone in disliking small talk. Yes, I have a history of social anxiety. I mean, I once hid behind Tim Gunn’s grandfather clock to avoid small talk at a fundraiser at his apartment.

Dear Miss Manners: Strangers want to make small talk with me while waiting in grocery checkout lines, at bus stops, at the bank, during flights, etc. I do not want to make friends with strangers every ...