High Involvement or High Consideration

So what conversational style are you?

High Involvement is where you run over each other's statements in an effort to convey rapport. No silence, or pauses between phrases and silence is seen as a indication of lack of rapport

High consideration emphasizes the exchange of ideas, and is "considerate". I.e. give people a time to get their entire thought out before starting into a reply. The same courtesy is expected back. Silence indicates rapport as it is a indication of being considerate to the other's chance to express themselves.

Me? I think I'm a high involvement, but I think I suck at high involvement. i.e. there are always a lot of silence going on which makes me feel like I'm not connecting, or doing a bad job of establishing rapport. I'd like to be more considerate, cause I know when I'm "bulldozing" over people and to be frank, I'm not all that comfortable in silence. Silence = bad in my book, and I try everything to avoid it.

Case in point. A friend of mine was telling this story. it was long winded, it was boring, and I could tell that people weren't really into the story. So rather than let it finish and have uncomfortable silence, I interjected with a humorous anecdote and started telling a funny story of my own. Everyone latched on and I didn't think anything of it, as I expect to be interrupted occasionally as well as that would indicate rapport to me. Evidentally this girl was of the "high consideration" style. She interrupts me and says, "excuse me, I was talking!" in a stern tone. The silence that I was trying to avoid comes in a even more awkward moment of how to respond. So I let her finish her story...and awkwardness abounded...

Oy. I'm sounding like a college professor aren't I? ick. I'm stopping now.

I'm starting to enjoy my vacation, even though I'm not doing anything...