Context
Context is everything a message is woven into. Leaving it out is incompetence, laziness, or arrogance, unless it's a hook built to make you ask.
Short answer
Context is everything a message is woven into, from who's asking and why now to what was already tried and what's needed back. It goes missing because the sender hears what the receiver can't. In a 1990 Stanford study, tappers expected listeners to name half their songs, and listeners named 3 of 120. Failure to convey context is incompetence, laziness, or arrogance, which is thinking you don't have to explain yourself. Some messages leave it out on purpose, as a hook to make you ask. The cost of missing context belongs to whoever left it out, so a message without it gets no response.
Key takeaways
- —Context is everything a message is woven into, from who's asking and why now to what the sender needs back
- —In a 1990 Stanford study, tappers expected listeners to name half their songs, and listeners named 3 of 120
- —Failure to convey context is incompetence, laziness, or arrogance, and arrogance is thinking you don't have to explain yourself
- —A message that holds back context on purpose is a hook, and the cost of the missing context belongs to whoever left it out
A link, and one word.
Thoughts?
Thoughts on what? The whole thing, or the line they were staring at when they hit send?
Are they saying they want my thoughts?
Are they saying they don't have their own thoughts?
Are they outsourcing thought?
What is going on?
They know. That's the problem. Everything they meant is still in their head, and none of it made the trip.
Context comes from the Latin contexere, to weave together. It's everything a message is woven into. Who's asking, why now, what they already tried, what they need back.
Send the message without it, and the other person gets one loose thread.
Context is key to communication and understanding.
So why does it go missing so often?
In 1990, a Stanford graduate student named Elizabeth Newton had people tap out the rhythm of a well-known song on a table while a listener tried to name it. Before the listeners guessed, the tappers predicted they'd get half.
Out of 120 songs, the listeners named 3.
The tapper hears the melody the whole time. The listener hears knocking.
Every message without context is knocking. The only one who hears the song is the one who sent it.
Knowing why doesn't let anyone off...
Failure to convey context is either incompetence, laziness, or arrogance.
Incompetence never realizes the other person only hears knocking.
Laziness could read it back from the other side, and doesn't bother.
Arrogance is thinking you don't have to explain yourself.
And some messages leave the context out on purpose.
Hey.
Got a minute?
That's a hook. It's built to make you ask. The second you reply what's up?, you've agreed to the conversation before you know what it's about.
So I don't answer any of them.
That has a cost. Sometimes the 2 a.m. call me is real.
But the cost of missing context belongs to whoever left it out. They were the only one in the conversation who had it.
Which puts every message I send through the same test.
Could a stranger act on it?
If a stranger couldn't, all I sent was knocking.
Sending me a message without context?
Expect no response.