Can asking more questions make people like you?

The easiest way to look interesting may be to become interested. But a question mark alone will not do it.

In two experiments, strangers liked conversation partners more when those partners had been prompted to ask more questions. The benefit was modest and belonged to the person inside the conversation—not to outsiders reading the transcript later.

The questions that carried the clearest signal were follow-ups. They showed that an answer had changed what happened next.

The person answering felt the difference

In the first experiment, 398 people met in 199 pairs for a 15-minute text chat. One person in each pair was randomly instructed to ask many or few questions. The other knew nothing about the instruction.

Afterward, the uninstructed partners liked the high-question askers more. The effect was real, but it was not a personality makeover.

A second experiment analyzed 338 people in 169 pairs. This time both partners received independent high- or low-question instructions. Once again, people liked partners who asked them more. Their own assigned question level—and whether the pair’s instructions matched—did not produce the same pattern.

That matters because the change appeared in the recipient’s judgment, not the asker’s self-assessment. Asking questions changed how the person across from them experienced the exchange.

Attention lives in the next question

Participants who asked more were also seen as more responsive: more likely to be listening, understanding, validating and caring about what their partner said. Statistical mediation linked that perception to the liking difference.

The most revealing evidence came from the shape of the conversation.

An introductory question opens a topic. A full-switch question leaves it. A follow-up stays with a detail the other person just offered. Those follow-ups were the type most consistently associated with responsiveness and liking.

That is why a tally misses the point. Ten disconnected questions can feel like an intake form. One thoughtful follow-up can make an answer feel received.

The effect disappeared outside the conversation

Another 612 people read transcripts from the second experiment. They did not show the same preference for the high-question askers.

From the outside, more questions were not a universal likability signal. The advantage appeared inside the exchange, where someone could feel what it was like to have their answer noticed.

This is a useful boundary for social advice. A conversational move can create a different experience without looking impressive to an audience. Connection and performance are not always the same thing.

Speed dates carried the pattern into a room

The researchers also analyzed face-to-face speed-dating conversations from 110 people, covering 1,961 yes-or-no second-date decisions.

Daters who asked a higher proportion of follow-up questions were more likely to receive interest in a second date. Other question types did not show the same relationship.

This was a real behavioral outcome, but the questions were observed rather than randomly assigned. A more attentive, compatible or socially skilled dater might both ask better follow-ups and receive more interest. The finding strengthens the pattern; it cannot prove that a particular question caused a particular yes.

A correction kept the core result intact

In March 2025, the journal corrected several reporting errors after an independent integrity and reproducibility audit. The notice states that the substantive result of every hypothesis test remained unchanged, the conclusions remained valid and the audit found no reason to doubt the integrity of data collection.

The audit also could not verify every source log and annotation step. And a reanalysis is not an independent replication. The updated record therefore supports the original bounded conclusion—not blind certainty beyond it.

When a question snaps back to the asker

A separate 2025 paper offers the perfect counterexample: boomerasking. Someone asks a question, waits for the answer and immediately supplies their own response to the same prompt.

Across those experiments, people read the move as more egocentric and less sincere, and they preferred a partner who disclosed directly. The question had promised attention. The next turn revealed where the attention was really going.

So ask, but do not count. Listen for the detail worth returning to. Curiosity becomes warm when another person can feel that their answer changed something.

Primary sources

1. Huang et al., 2017
2. APA correction, 2025
3. Independent audit materials
4. Yeomans et al., 2019 author reply
5. Brooks and Yeomans, 2025 boomerasking experiments

Independent editorial summary. The authors are not affiliated with LifeScore.