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Better yet, for some people, the expectation of this mostly-async communication is that you will respond as quickly as they type. My adult son deals with anxie

Better yet, for some people, the expectation of this mostly-async communication is that you will respond as quickly as they type. My adult son deals with anxiety, and when he's stressed, I'll get multiple texts in a row. If I'm not responding for some reason, one of them will be "???" as in, "hello, are you going to respond?" A bit of temperature-lowering, sanity enhancement, comes from using the auto-set sleep/focus settings in iMessage, and training him to understand that random texts in the middle of the night can, and will wait until we're awake enough to look. If it's really that critical, a phone call can still work.

cgriswald 4y ago
Indeed, I should have mentioned that as well. Nearly all of the people who compulsively[0] respond ASAP have an expectation that their recipients will do so as well. Sometimes they have an anxiety response, like apparently your son, sometimes they have an anger response, or a hurt response… it's like "expectation is the root of suffering" in action. [0] - As opposed to people who do so for other reasons, like others in these threads have mentioned doing.
- tlavoie 4y ago
  Regarding anxiety vs anger vs hurt response, why pick just one? Indeed, our son's expectations are sometimes pretty unidirectional. (Mental health stuff, depends how he's doing at the time.) With some effort though, this gradual training of expectations seems to help. Similarly perhaps, I came across a suggestion recently for scheduling email as a matter of course. I tend to respond immediately (if not too intrusive), or make a note to come back to something I mean to respond to, but this idea was that perhaps some time lag as a regular thing makes sense. If I recall correctly, the recipient is not only fine with the delay, but actually considers your response as more worthwhile, because you likely put some time into it. Perception vs reality? If perception is what matters more, that might be a reasonable approach.

cgriswald 4y ago

Indeed, I should have mentioned that as well. Nearly all of the people who compulsively[0] respond ASAP have an expectation that their recipients will do so as well. Sometimes they have an anxiety response, like apparently your son, sometimes they have an anger response, or a hurt response… it's like "expectation is the root of suffering" in action. [0] - As opposed to people who do so for other reasons, like others in these threads have mentioned doing.

tlavoie 4y ago
Regarding anxiety vs anger vs hurt response, why pick just one? Indeed, our son's expectations are sometimes pretty unidirectional. (Mental health stuff, depends how he's doing at the time.) With some effort though, this gradual training of expectations seems to help. Similarly perhaps, I came across a suggestion recently for scheduling email as a matter of course. I tend to respond immediately (if not too intrusive), or make a note to come back to something I mean to respond to, but this idea was that perhaps some time lag as a regular thing makes sense. If I recall correctly, the recipient is not only fine with the delay, but actually considers your response as more worthwhile, because you likely put some time into it. Perception vs reality? If perception is what matters more, that might be a reasonable approach.