May we borrow a moment of your time to review basic niceties? You might think you’ve heard them all before—because you have—but certain polite lingo is dropping out of the modern lexicon. That’s bad ...

Society has taught women that they have to be polite. Even when things are deeply impacting them and causing them distress, it’s encouraged that they remain “lady-like” to keep from being seen as ...

Ever find yourself talking to someone who seems perfectly polite, but you leave the conversation feeling uneasy or dismissed? Sometimes, the words people use sound friendly on the surface, but there’s ...

Tension: In our efforts to maintain politeness, we may unknowingly use phrases that, while seemingly courteous, can inadvertently reveal a lack of emotional intelligence, leading to misunderstandings ...

For decades, a social psychologist named John Bargh has conducted studies on the way words affect behavior. In one such study, undergraduate students were given a scrambled-sentence test. One version ...

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I’m a politically liberal person with like-minded friends. Occasionally, in the course of a conversation, a friend advises me that my use of a word or phrase was unacceptable. I’ve ...

Tensions in adult child and parent relationships can harm quality of life for both sides, but they stem from various experiences — from emotional disconnect to different values, childhood trauma, and ...