Plenty of single people have witnessed how curiosity dies in real time: It happens seated across from a first date who doesn’t seem interested in asking you a question. Or, maybe worse, it happens when you’re the person who has no questions for someone who seemed like a promising potential crush.
The wildest thing about these bleak anti-meet cutes is that no one does this on purpose. No one wants to go on bad dates; few people think of themselves as apathetic conversationalists. Yet, all across this big world, lousy encounters continue.
What gives?
According to relationship experts I spoke to, the most important thing for a dater to be is curious about the person they’re meeting. That can be surprisingly hard, in part because many people show up to coffee or drinks knowing too much.
There’s Google, for one thing — a surefire way to take the mystery out of any stranger — and then there are the apps that might have helped you find the date in the first place. With their computer algorithms touting compatibility, swiping has flattened our romantic interest.
This isn’t to say that people didn’t go on bad dates before the rise of Tinder, Bumble, and OkCupid, but those platforms aren’t as helpful as they seem for actually connecting.
Maintaining some air of in-person wonder is absolutely vital to getting to know another person for real.
The dating and relationship experts I spoke to shared a few of their surefire questions to ask to spark curiosity:
- What’s your favorite childhood memory? Do you want to replicate it with your own family someday?
- What’s your biggest fear?
- What’s something that makes you laugh?
All of these questions encourage the person answering to tell a story and have a point of view, and they also make the person asking an active listener. A question doesn’t have to be particularly deep or probing — one expert recommended asking what media personalities, celebrities, and influencers your date follows. The goal of each of these questions is to feed our curiosities.
Alexandra Solomon, a psychologist and author who teaches at Northwestern University and specializes in relationships, told me the best question to ask on a date is: “What made you light up this week?”
As she explained, it isn’t fixed. The time provides a frame, so your date doesn’t have to go searching the recesses of their memory, but the timeliness keeps the answer from skewing into something generic. It also breaks up the monotony of “best” or “favorite” replies.
Of course, some dates are destined to die on the vine regardless of how curious you are. Sometimes you — or your date — could be as eager and endearing as can be, but the spark isn’t there.
If worse comes to worst, you could always just go back to the apps, maybe having learned something new.
