A major function of the "phatics" of "Hello" and "How are you doing" is to calibrate to a person's speech. Saying "Hi, How are you?" before saying anything impo

A major function of the "phatics" of "Hello" and "How are you doing" is to calibrate to a person's speech. Saying "Hi, How are you?" before saying anything important much reduces the odds you'll have to repeat yourself. There are papers on this.