Pondering

Interpreting what people say is a mechanism of the brain that automatically works in all human beings regardless of language.  People understand the nuances of others' words without any problem.  Especially during the socialization process, when children turn into teenagers and continue through adolescence, do people learn to "read" what people are saying with their words and their intentions.

Adolescents learn that words can take on all kinds of meanings.  So, they experiment with fad language with all kinds of words.  Cool is no longer about the weather, but is uttered when something beneficial happens or when something trendy surfaces.  Bad becomes the opposite in meaning, but good doesn't change at all.  Sarcasm is a staple of the teenager's language currency because it allows them to say what they mean and then change to the literal meaning from the opposite meaning if someone questions their intentions.  During socialization, people learn to be ambiguous so the use of the auxiliary verbs may and might, should and would increases.

One of the last things to be learned about nuances usually comes in the mid to late twenties.  People learn to respond to one part of a statement but not to another portion of the same statement.  Doing so makes the listeners think that the person is giving assent or acknowledgment to the rest of the statement because no comment was made about it.

However, a person has to be a really astute observer of language to know how to interpret what is not said.  Learning that aspect of language prepares one for the final step in learning nuances.  What do silences mean?  Like the rest of language, silence is heavily context-dependent for full meaning.  Some silences are  easy to interpret.  If someone doesn't want to do something, he will be silent, hoping you will move on to something else and not probe the silence.  Or, if someone doesn't want to be negative, "it is better to say nothing at all than to say something negative," a very common saying across the U.S.

Dislike and disagreement cover about 50% of the territory for silence, but that leaves a lot of uncovered ground for the other meanings for silence.  So, it's not exactly a necessary life skill to learn to interpret the range of meanings for silence, but excellent observers learn to make appropriate responses to silences and navigate more easily in human relationships.

Other reasons for silence are ineptness, indifference, highlighting a point of conversation, proving a point, inattention, uncertainty, formulating thought, comparison, groping for a frame of reference, disbelief, or deception.  Other reasons abound, so context becomes supremely important.

Many people don't probe the array of meanings for silence because they don't like silence for themselves.  They create distractions like having the radio or television constantly playing in the background to take their minds from observing the meanings of silence.  But, silence works for me.  I like it because it causes me to ponder situations.  One of the semantic domains of ponder is silence (or at the very least, focus and concentration).  Pondering is a revelatory experience for me.  During the process of pondering I review conversations for both what is not said about about something in general and in particular.

I'm not 100% in navigating smoothly from interpreting silences accurately, but I try hard to understand both what people don't say and why they are silent.  It helps.  And, I depend on forgiveness for those inept moments when I misinterpret silence.