Here’s how to shut down “predatory curiosity.”
I have one kid. I am happy with one kid. Yet, over the years, dozens of people have asked if I’m ever going to “give her a sibling.”
When I say no, the next question is usually a version of “won’t she be lonely?” At a party, someone once asked, “What happens when you and your husband die, and your daughter has no family?” Questions like these make me feel judged — like I am deliberately harming my daughter, or that I didn’t think things through.
At some point, most of us have been dismayed by invasive questions: Why are you still working — shouldn’t you be retired by now? Why aren’t you in a relationship? How come you’re still unemployed? Many of us hear the same ones so often that we can sense the ramp-up.
These questions are often a tactic for people to share their own points of view, said Scott Shigeoka, a fellow at the Greater Good Science Center at the University of California, Berkeley, and the author of “Seek: How Curiosity Can Transform Your Life and Change the World.”
When you’re genuinely curious about someone, Shigeoka explained, “the message is ‘I want to understand you.’” But when people ask questions with an agenda, they’re using something that he calls “predatory curiosity.” In that case, Shigeoka said, “they’re saying, I want to change you.” (In my case, people were trying to convince me of the joys of having a large family.)
I asked experts for advice on how to navigate these questions.
Remember that you don’t owe anyone an answer.
First, “take a moment to tune into yourself to see if you want to answer that question,” Adia Gooden, a clinical psychologist in Chicago, said.