[lttlrck]

the shift from a asynchronous communications (email) to real-time chat (slack/teams) may have led to a significant reduction in "thinking things through"

Writing an email or a SO question has a pretty significant upfront investment and requires clearer articulation, whereas real-time chat seems to lead to shallow enquiry.

In other words with real-time chat, the recipient has become the rubber duck.

[tharkun__]

Absolutely. I don't personally use a rubber duck when alone but we call it that in the team when you just wave someone over to your desk to talk something over (and now virtually in a quick call).

I personally have always liked writing down my "conclusions" so far into an evolving comment on a defect/bug ticket, which I only actually submit at the end when I've found the real issue. In the end you have a nice explanation of what exactly and why it went wrong and it helps with the actual debugging/thinking it through. And it also helps with the inevitable comments/questions in the PR when people wonder why the hell you are making the change you're making and you have something refer back to.