Theodore Talk: How to Communicate with Someone Who Disagrees with You

In our highly polarized societies, chances are good that you have run across someone who disagrees with you. Whether you just want increased harmony or you want to get your views across despite the hostile terrain, both can be achieved with key communication strategies. Even people who are highly resistant to you and your ideas can lower their guard and embrace your information if you (a) identify which of the prevailing cognitive obstacles is behind an audience's resistance to your facts and (b) communicate in a way that targets the underlying reasons for the resistance (which are often not the same reasons your audience thinks are driving his/her/their resistance). This presentation will help you understand what is happening in the brain of someone who disagrees with you and will arm you with surprising (yet practical) strategies for persuading even the most averse audience and achieving better discussions and relations in the process.

Mensan Jenny Grant Rankin, PhD, has taught these strategies at Columbia University and the University of Cambridge, as well as in her books and Psychology Today online column, and while training federal agents, researchers, business executives, educators, and others on the best ways to share information. This engaging presentation will merge rich storytelling with comprehensive research to surprise you, delight you, and inform you along the way. You surely have a wealth of knowledge to share as a Mensan, and this Theodore Talk will help your brilliant ideas gain a more brilliant reception, no matter your audience's initial opposition.

Register for this presentation here.

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Theodore Talks take place on Zoom the fourth Sunday of each month at 2:30 p.m. CT.

A list of future Theodore Talks can be found on the Mensa National Events Calendar at https://www.us.mensa.org/attend/calendar/.

Questions?  Contact Brad Lucht at MensaTheodoreTalks@gmail.com.