Asking Questions Boosts Wellbeing — Especially for Boys
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- Niobe Way, a professor of applied psychology at NYU, argues that prior curiosity research neglected questions about other people's lives, focusing instead on intellectual interests in the physical and natural world.
- In a study of 389 students aged 11-13, Way and colleagues found those who asked personal questions of close friends, teachers, and caregivers reported better friendships and greater overall wellbeing.
- Boys were about twice as likely as girls to report having 'no questions' for others, and the more students endorsed macho statements like 'I do not let it show when my feelings are hurt,' the less they said they enjoyed hearing others' stories.
- Way's Listening with Curiosity Project — a 26-lesson curriculum rolled out in New York Public Schools — produced greater curiosity and improved friendship quality by the end, with boys showing the biggest gains.
- Way traces the suppression of interpersonal curiosity to Western patriarchal conditioning that frames personal questions as prying and labels curiosity about others as 'feminine,' leaving it undervalued in science.
- Way was inspired to study the topic after moving to Shanghai with her children in 2007 and finding that, upon returning to the US, 'literally nobody' asked her questions about the experience.
Why it matters: The findings give educators and parents a concrete lever: Way's 26-lesson curriculum, tested in New York Public Schools, measurably improved adolescents' friendship quality — with boys, who started furthest behind, showing the largest gains. That offers a targeted intervention for the well-documented link between social connection and long-term health.
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