The Secret Power of Using ‘We’ During Difficult Conversations

When you’re delivering a message that might upset another person, there’s one simple thing you can do to increase buy-in: Use “we” instead of “you.”

In a series of studies , researchers found that in conflict-laden interactions—such as employee reviews or political conversations—“the use of ‘you’ can make someone feel targeted and less likely to engage,” says Mohamed A. Hussein , an assistant professor of marketing at Columbia Business School and co-author of the paper. In contrast, “we” came across as more inclusive and led to others being more interested in interacting.

“It signals receptiveness, which enhances persuasiveness,” Hussein says.

One of the five studies presented in the paper looked at comments on the online forum Reddit in discussion groups labeled as liberal and conservative. It found that comments that used “you” pronouns were censored by moderators at higher rates than those that used “we.”

“At first we thought, maybe this isn’t about pronouns, but instead about the context or co-occurrences with swear words, emotional comments or topics like Black Lives Matter,” Hussein says. “But even after controlling for all that, comments that used ‘you’ pronouns resulted in greater censorship compared to those that used ‘we’ pronouns.”

A later experiment had participants imagine they were online content moderators, with the ability to decide whether to remove an opinionated comment about contentious issues such as abortion and immigration. Participants were three times as likely to censor comments that used “you” pronouns, compared with those that used “we” pronouns. “The imagined moderators perceived that the ‘you’ comments were aggressive and hostile and would lead readers to be less receptive,” Hussein says.

An aid to persuasion

In another experiment, participants were asked about their attitudes around lowering the legal drinking age. Each participant then read a persuasive speech that was in direct opposition to their stated belief, with some reading a speech that used “you” and others a speech that used “we.”

For instance, one speech opposed to lowering the drinking age said in part, “You shouldn’t let your own hesitation about a younger drinking age cloud your judgment and endanger others.” Another version of that same speech said, “We shouldn’t let our own hesitation about a younger drinking age cloud our judgment and endanger others.”

The study found that when people read a pitch that used “you” pronouns, they were less receptive to the argument and less likely to be persuaded than those who read a nearly identical pitch using “we” pronouns.

A follow-up experiment aimed to see if a similar effect would apply more generally, especially in the work context. Participants were asked to imagine they were working on a project that was led by one colleague and that it didn’t go well. Next, participants were told to imagine that they were in charge of deciding whether to share negative feedback left for the project leader by other colleagues.

When the criticism used “we” pronouns, participants were around 16% more likely to want to share the criticism with their poorly performing team leader than when the feedback used “you” pronouns.

Modeling openness

The research overall shows that the more leaders can use “we” rather than “you” pronouns during difficult conversations with an employee or team member, the more likely the employee will be open to the feedback, Hussein says. The same holds true, he says, for political or other negatively charged interactions.

“If you seem like you’re an open-minded person yourself, people naturally want to reciprocate that,” Hussein says. “Changing the pronouns you use from ‘you’ to ‘we’ can make your audience more open to your message. It’s kind of a secret power.”

Heidi Mitchell is a writer in Chicago and London. She can be reached at reports@wsj.com .