[beefield]

> Because of this I often make explicit when I converse that I'm engaging in a "collaborative exploration" and not an fight about who is right.

Have you found that successful? One of my big struggles in my social life is that I am quite curious how things are and more often than not my discussion/arguments are interpreted somehow so that I supposedly want to show my "opponent" is wrong. And really, most of the time, who is right and who is wrong is one of the last things crossing my mind.

[tenpoundhammer]

I had the same problem my whole life up until about two years ago. For whatever reason my default mindset was that when I heard something I didn't understand or was curious about, I would explain my understanding and frame that against what I thought was wrong about their understanding. I then expected them to respond in a similar way. To the majority of people this seems confrontational and argumentative, so everyone just thought I was being a know it all jerk.

I changed to only asking questions and/or mirroring back what they said. The change in strategy answers my curiosities and helps people to feel like you are listening to them and care about what they have to say. Hope it helps.

[digitaltrees]

Curiosity requires a degree of comfort in being wrong and confidence in yourself. Unfortunately many people think if they are “wrong” or don’t know something they are stupid and so asking questions makes them feel that they are wrong and thus stupid. Once you empathize with them it’s easier to navigate just as you discovered.

[yboris]

One great technique for understanding others (and often as a bonus also showing them they don't know what they are talking about) is to simply ask for the mechanism they are describing.

So when someone is in favor of policy X, ask them how X accomplishes the goal they are in favor of -- what is the cause-effect chain.

This (at least according to psychologists' research) usually makes people more cognizant of the gaps in their understanding, and also more receptive to alternative solutions or explanations.

[azinman2]

Perhaps tone and word choice can help here, as well as communicating your pretext. Also, just because you’re curious doesn’t mean others share the same curiosity in the moment… depending on how and what you probe you can be irritating even if that’s not your intention.