Talking to strangers

In a world of increasing social isolation and staggering rates of loneliness, Genevieve Gannon finds the cure may be the simple art of small talk.

- Genevieve Gannon

Earlier this year I found myself sitting at a table in a Melbourne cafe, feeling uncomfortable and self-conscious as I tried to summon the courage to talk to one of the other customers. I had started 2020, as many of us do, by downloading an app with the expectation it would transform me into an all-round better person. My first task was to find someone drinking a coffee and engage them in conversation. The researcher who developed the app says small talk is a powerful tool to combat loneliness and cultivate a sense of community. Her studies have shown measurable improvements in people’s moods and mental health if they take the time to talk to strangers. But interrupting the solitude of the people reading their newspapers seemed like a big social risk, and I was not confident it would pay off.

As I fought against my instinct to stay quiet, the words of the app’s designer were playing in my head. “Nothing horrible happens if someone doesn’t want to talk to you,” UK psychologist Gillian Sandstrom had told me. She had observed that people often wrongly assume others won’t like us, or will think we’re weird if we try to talk to them. But her research found only about 10 per cent of people will resist an attempt to engage in friendly chit-chat, and she reminded me rejection isn’t a big deal.

Gazing at the stony faces in the cafe, I was sceptical, but then I spotted a workaround – the barista was smiling as he frothed some milk. I had detected an Italian accent when I’d ordered so I sidled up to the counter.

“What part of Italy are you from?”