10 Rules for Talking

Psychologist Dr Tim Harkness has noticed something: sometimes it seems that everyone is shouting, but nobody is listening. Surely we don''t need to learn how to talk. Aren''t we all born with an innate talent for communication and connection?

And yet, in an age of Brexit and Trump, where social media provides a platform for instantaneous, unfettered opinion, doesn''t it sometimes feel that we''ve lost our ability to move our discussions forward? In the modern world, as our conversations and tone become ever-more adversarial we can find ourselves alienated from those who don''t share precisely our opinion. Climate change, diversity, TimesUp, Twitter spats, two-party political systems - the list of intense debate-generating topics goes on, but resolution often feels further away than ever.

And it''s not just in the public sphere where we can improve - at home, in our friendships, with our family, at work, we need to find a new way to talk productively. 10 Rules for Talking is a timely guide to help us retrain o