Some professors might recoil at the idea of looking at their students’ dating app profiles. Not Gurit Birnbaum, a professor of psychology at Reichman University. She saw it as an opportunity. 

Some of the young people in Birnbaum’s classes, as well as close friends, asked for her advice and turned their phones over to her. After poring over their bios and photos, she had some opinions. 

What stood out were a few commonalities in how they presented themselves to potential partners: “Some profiles revealed almost nothing, others revealed too much. Some relied heavily on sexualized images, while many simply blended into a sea of interchangeable, generic profiles,” Birnbaum told Vox in an email. Many people seemed unsure of how to uniquely introduce themselves, instead offering a laundry list of qualities. She wondered which profiles sparked genuine interest and what characteristics these singles successfully transmitted. So she decided to research what more dating app users choose to reveal about themselves and how they go about it.

The results of those studies allowed Birnbaum and her collaborators to zero in on a few concrete strategies for crafting a dating profile that is not only authentic, but would get people to swipe right. Her findings, along with those from other researchers, can help everyday singles put their best foot forward. 

“The goal shouldn’t be to turn yourself into a product,” Birnbaum said. “The real challenge is getting the right kind of attention without losing yourself in the process.”

Get creative — but don’t exaggerate

One of the biggest misconceptions when it comes to online dating is that you must impress people and sell yourself, Liesel Sharabi, an associate professor in human communication at Arizona State University, told Vox. That mindset can lead you to present a slightly exaggerated or more idealized version of yourself. “That can be effective for getting a date or starting a conversation, but then by the time you actually end up meeting, it can lead to a lot of disappointment and even feelings that someone’s been misled, even if that’s not actually the case,” Sharabi said.

Instead of embellishing the details of your life, use your creative skills to package reality in an attention-grabbing way. Research shows daters value originality in dating app profiles — it signals intelligence and sense of humor. The profiles that were perceived as original contained vivid descriptions and imagery, metaphors, and frequent uses of adjectives and adverbs. Think: “I’m a star in the kitchen.” (They also contained elements of self-disclosure — more on that later.)

These specifics give daters an opening to start a conversation with you. Instead of simply saying you like running, you can express that same information with a cheeky call to action: “Tell me about your favorite running trails.”

When in doubt, Sharabi said, ask a friend to look over your profile to see if you’re being authentic or bending the truth — and take their feedback seriously.

Tell a story

Birnbaum’s research has shown that narrative presentations — in other words, short stories — are more effective at garnering empathy and interest than a list of likes and dislikes. Storytelling helps people see you as a person rather than a bunch of traits, which encourages perspective-taking and can foster empathy. “Empathy may be less the initial spark of attraction than the bridge from noticing someone to feeling that you might actually connect with them,” she said.

So consider reframing your best qualities in a way where you’re actively doing, experiencing, or reacting to something. In lieu of describing yourself as simply “funny,” Birnbaum suggests something more illustrative like, “I laugh at my own jokes first. It’s a character flaw.” Or instead of “outdoorsy,” try, “Most weekends I disappear into a trail, come back sunburned, and swear I’ll bring more water next time.”

“Those tiny stories bring a person to life in a way that generic descriptions simply don’t,” she said. And avoid using ChatGPT to craft these bios; people can spot AI-generated writing, and no one knows your life better than you do.

Be selective with how much you share

How much you choose to reveal about yourself is an art. Birnbaum found that sharing too little can be a signal you’re not serious about finding a relationship, while exposing too much may be overwhelming to potential dates. “Moderate disclosure seems to strike the right balance: enough information to create trust and a sense of connection, but not so much that curiosity disappears before the first date,” she said.

In the study on originality in dating app profiles, concrete self-disclosures were rated as more original. Think: “I start every day with waffles and ice cream,” over “I’m a foodie.”

Convey your willingness to get to know someone

Research has shown that feeling known by your partner predicts relationship satisfaction. But often, when singles create their dating app profiles, they can be a little too self-centric. You know what you’re looking for in a partner, after all. But it’s also important to communicate that you’d like to get to know someone else. So, how to signal your openness to understanding someone in your dating app profile? 

In one study, Juliana Schroeder, a professor of management of organizations at the Haas School of Business, UC Berkeley, and her co-author found that dating app profiles that attracted the most interest were those who expressed an interest in knowing the person on the other end. In practice, that might look like expressing how you’re a good listener or your curiosity. Something as simple as, “I’m the kind of person who loves to ask questions. Be prepared,” gets the point across.

“Even if it’s something vague and just a signal that you’ll be the kind of person who will actually try to get to know them and try to support them,” Schroeder told Vox. “That’s what I would think people are missing in their profiles, and that’s what the research suggests that they could put in there.”

Use photos to accompany your bio

Photos are often the first thing other daters see on apps, so you’ll want to make sure they’re an accurate representation of you today. Not five years ago. Not with a hat or sunglasses on.

“A picture that would tell me if I show up somewhere, will I be able to recognize them based on the pictures they’re posting?” Sharabi, the human communication professor, said.

Beyond that, pictures can be a means of augmenting or contextualizing the words in your profile. In her research on storytelling in dating app profiles, Birnbaum found that photos that presented people’s lives narratively were more effective at garnering empathy than a random assortment of images. “Rather than posting a collection of disconnected flattering shots, choose attractive but authentic photos that show different facets of your life and, ideally, work together as a coherent slice of life,” she said. Put simply: If you like rock climbing, you may want to include an image of you bouldering at the gym. 

Dating app profiles, if done correctly, can be a savvy way of presenting yourself to other daters. And, as the science shows, there are ways to be a little more strategic at creating them. Just think of your life as a story a potential partner will want to be a part of.

When was the last time you played? Took part in an enjoyable activity for the sake of it, with no particular outcome? A moment where you laughed, felt awe, curiosity, creativity? Where time flew by? If you’re over the age of, say, 7, your answer is probably not recently.

According to Mia Sundstrom, CEO of the National Institute for Play, an organization that studies play and champions research-backed playful policies, American society is in a bit of a play drought. Attention spans are shrinking, the country is more polarized than ever, and some people might be more comfortable communicating with AI than other humans. “Our world is really overwhelming, and what we’re starting to see is these almost spontaneous bursts of playfulness infiltrate back into our society almost as a rebellion against the things that feel really hard and scary right now,” Sundstrom told Vox.

That desire for levity might explain the proliferation of “whimsical” online content and unconventional workout classes and events, Sundstrom said. In other words, play, which she defined as both a state (marked by experimentation and risk-taking) and a disposition (a curious, creative, and optimistic way of moving throughout the world). 

Playfulness benefits us all, not just kids. Playful people perceive less stress and have higher well-being, and life satisfaction. It also just feels good to partake in an activity that takes you out of the difficulties of life, if just for a little while. To help push back against the forces of seriousness, Sundstrom outlines three easy ways to imbue your life with more play. 

1. Figure out your “play style”

Play is highly subjective: What one person considers enjoyable might be another’s personal hell. And just because an activity brings you a moderate amount of enjoyment doesn’t mean it’s necessarily good for you. (Take mindlessly scrolling on your phone, for instance.) To be a more playful person, you need to consider — or remember — what makes you feel a little silly. The National Institute for Play developed six “play styles” to help people determine what activities light them up. For example, “creators” play through art, music, design, and performance while “competitors” like playing games or sports.

If you struggle to even pinpoint your play style, Sundstrom suggests recalling past memories of play. When was the last time you truly lost track of time or laughed so hard you cried with people you loved? What were you doing?

“Try and recall that vividly, because play is who we are before the world tells us who we have to be,” she said. “Whatever you loved to do early on, there’s a good chance somewhere inside of you that is still in there and is a great little spark for you to re-access play.” It’s likely you gradually stopped these playful hobbies, perhaps due to the demands of adult life, and picking them back up with no expectation can put you in touch with your younger self. 

2. Make your environment more conducive to play

Based on your play style, you might consider low- or no-cost upgrades to your physical space to make play easier. “In physical spaces, the fastest and easiest things you can do are how can you add bright colors or something that feels inspiring to you, whether that’s a picture of your favorite place or a memory that jogs back play, something that is a visual cue to you that brings you back to a play state,” Sundstrom said. You might keep some scrap paper handy to doodle while you’re on the phone, use brightly colored files to organize your important documents, or use a colorful keyboard instead of a standard one. 

Kids can make any space more playful. If you have children in your life, try to adopt their mindset: the curiosity, the wonder. And if you don’t have little ones, take inspiration from a childlike version of yourself and make decisions from their point of view, Sundstrom said.

Many adults, especially moms, feel pressure to curate a high-octane play experience for kids, Sundstrom said. But a more playful environment can simply incorporate an inside joke, a wink whenever you leave the room, or a silly way of greeting each other.

3. Find some bite-sized versions of play that you can add to your daily routine

Once you’ve figured out, say, adventuring and new experiences are what make you feel alive (also known as the “explorer” play style), what tiny measures can you take to regularly engage in play? 

“Even 30 seconds of a dance break or belting your favorite song or creating a handshake with somebody as you enter or exit a room, that is enough to create that play spark and to start those brain activations that do foster the deeper creativity and adaptability and resilience that build the play mindset,” Sundstrom said. 

The best places to infuse play are during moments of boredom, Sundstrom said. To allow yourself space to be bored, put your phone in another room during any downtime and when you would ordinarily feel the urge to pick up your device, do something playful instead. Anything from practicing an accent or turning on a random radio station and imagining what the musical artist looks like.

The world may be serious, but individuals can take ownership over how much whimsy and levity they bring to it. Who knows? You might make someone else’s day more playful, too.

There are two kinds of people in this world: those who find it acceptable to be a little tardy and those who consider it an affront to all that is decent. As someone who frequently runs late, I’m often relieved when someone else is, too. And I don’t mind if a friend is a bit behind; the worst-case scenario is I have a few minutes of peace in which to stare at my phone. But the perpetually punctual see this as disrespect, as showing up late is a sign you don’t value others’ time, that you believe what you’re doing is more important.

The reality is often much more banal. Chronically late people may overestimate how long something will take them (like getting ready or commuting), are perhaps multitasking, or lose track of time. 

Of course, few people would be satisfied with waiting at a restaurant for an hour while their date swears they’re only ten minutes away. Is there a socially acceptable sweet spot for tardiness that satisfies both the need for punctuality while giving grace to the time-challenged? To answer that question, I enlisted the help of three people with unique viewpoints: an etiquette expert, a researcher who has studied lateness, and an extremely punctual guy who has strong feelings on the matter.

Answers have been lightly edited and condensed for clarity.

The etiquette expert: You get a 15ish-minute buffer to casual events, 5 minutes for everything else

“Five minutes late to a Zoom call or a scheduled phone call for work is, in my mind, really late. Five minutes late to meet your friend at a restaurant is not very late and very forgivable. Five minutes late to their house, super forgivable. Half an hour late to dinner and they won’t seat you and now you’ve lost your table, that starts to be a bit annoying. Late to a surprise party is unforgivable. I’ve seen hosts get really upset about that one because you can likely ruin a very well-planned surprise. There’s a 15-to-30-minute arrival period for most gatherings. You push past that and you’re showing up really late. If you are going to be late, let somebody know, whether it’s a phone call or a text message.

If you were only getting together for an hour and you’re starting to push the half-hour mark, you might want to check in with someone about whether you’ve really messed up and it’s not worth it for them to stay and meet with you for 20 minutes by the time you arrive. 

There are definitely friends who take advantage of other people’s time and that would be something to talk with someone about if it’s chronic and to the point where it starts ruining the experience. You could say, ‘I know that you’re often 20 to 30 minutes late when we get together for something. It would mean a lot if you could try to be on time at seven for this one.’ We can’t control how other people react. They might feel offended. They might start rattling off reasons why they’re always late and you can say, ‘I know and I understand it really does happen, but it’s been consistent enough and this one’s important. I would really love to have you get there at the start time.’ I think that can make a difference.”

—Lizzie Post, co-author of Emily Post’s Etiquette: The Centennial Edition

The lateness researcher: It depends on the cultural norms of the people involved

“Being late differs across the world. We have wide windows of time or very narrow ones depending on the culture. In our research, we were comparing Dutch, South African, and Pakistani norms. We knew that there would be differences, but we had no idea how much. Pakistanis really have a different idea about lateness. They’re much more flexible about it. The window’s much wider. For the Dutch and South Africans, the window is about 15 minutes. After that, people will start thinking they’re not coming anymore or start calling. But for Pakistanis, that moment arrives much later.

For people who grew up in cultures that are more aligned with the Protestant work ethic, we would say there’s a deal between two people about the time frame. If you don’t conform to that, then you violate that norm and then you are late. For Pakistanis, it is a time frame that aligns with the clock, but it depends on who is there, not so much as a deal between two people. The Dutch are very egalitarian. Everyone, it doesn’t matter what status you have, is allowed about 15 minutes. But we saw that for Pakistanis, if you’re meeting a very important person, then they can arrive much later.

There’s also a bit of the emotional side or the feeling that you are personally responsible and you’re rude if you don’t stick to those norms. I discussed this in class with my students because a lot of them show up late. I was saying, ‘I think it’s very rude when there’s somebody presenting and they get interrupted by doors opening.’ A lot of them said, ‘I don’t think it’s rude.’ They had different norms about that situation. Some of them agreed with me, but not everyone.

In practice, I think that it depends on how important the appointment is. In our class, we emphasized that we as teachers find being on time important. The norm violation becomes more important when it is explicit. And I have a sense that now the students are more apologetic.

In developing intercultural skills, ‘bridging’ is often trained. One of the things in bridging is to make expectations explicit. It involves explaining how violating the norms surrounding them are experienced, and then trying to find solutions that are acceptable for both sides. Often, this leads to people agreeing that it means give and take, but it can also mean changing procedures or rules.”

—Wendelien van Eerde, associate professor at Amsterdam Business School at the University of Amsterdam

The punctual guy: Actually, just be early

“For a home-hosted dinner party, no more than 30 minutes late before it’s inconsiderate. 

For dinner reservations at a restaurant, five minutes before is inconsiderate as normally your party can’t be seated until everyone is there and making everyone wait for you isn’t cool. 

For house party gatherings, show up whenever unless specifically asked by the host to be there at a specific time. 

For work-related situations, like being on set ready to shoot at your scheduled call time, be there five minutes before your call time. The crew got there on time to prepare for you. Show them the same respect. Your time is not more valuable than theirs.”

—Bobby Berk, interior designer and host of HGTV’s Junk or Jackpot?

The bottom line: Be considerate and communicate

Try as we might to get everything done, leave the house in a timely manner, and hope for no traffic, life often has other plans. Lateness happens. But as long as you make a good faith effort to be on time, openly communicate when you’re running behind, and don’t make a habit of it, consider a 10-to-15 minute window an appropriate buffer. Any later and you might start to lose goodwill.

It’s the act that’s defined a generation, an experience so common it’s become memeified: canceling plans. Bailing is a litmus test of sorts; who and what events you back out of says a lot about you as a person. Are you the type who commits and only bails when absolutely necessary? Or are you a frequent flake looking to change their ways? (No judgment here: The occasional canceling of plans is acceptable, and you shouldn’t feel guilty about it.)

Call it a byproduct of overscheduling, a facet of introversion, or a condition of mild social anxiety, but bailing is a popular tool in our social arsenal. Regularly deployed mere hours ahead of a previously scheduled engagement we’ve come to dread, canceling was once considered a get-out-of-obligation-free card. In recent years, though, general consensus around bowing out has seemed to shift, perhaps spurred by the growing attention paid to the dangers of social isolation or simply because being consistently bailed on feels like garbage. All of which is to say, canceling requires much more tact than simply rattling off a text 30 minutes before you’re supposed to meet up with a friend.

There are, of course, valid reasons to skip a movie night (you’re sick, for instance) and very few excuses good enough to justify not showing up to a wedding you RSVP’d to. But rather than giving in to the impulse to flake when the urge hits, it’s important to make a more considered choice based not on how much you think you’ll enjoy a social event but on the consequences of skipping. 

Consider this your canceling checklist, a bailing thought experiment, a toolkit for bowing out. Taken together, the following five questions will help inform your decision on whether to skip a social engagement.

Who are you bailing on?

Before flaking, take your audience into consideration — namely, whether this is a person you’d be comfortable inconveniencing. Because we’ve already invested significant time and energy into close relationships with family and friends, we’re more likely to want to preserve those relationships by upholding plans. This past history can influence how comfortable we are with bailing.

“How important is this person?” Julian Givi, an associate professor of marketing at West Virginia University, tells Vox. “Do I value this person’s friendship, or are they someone that I’m okay with canceling on? Have they canceled on me?”

Close friends are complicated. In a study, William Chopik, an associate professor in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, found that participants reported being most upset when a best friend canceled on them, compared with when a good friend or acquaintance canceled. Ironically, though, that closeness gives us latitude. People also tend to be more forgiving when close friends cancel on them, Chopik says. By virtue of knowing someone so intimately, we understand the constraints on their time and can intuit they’d only cancel for a good reason. It’s also safe to assume we’ll likely see them again soon, too.

We may feel less obligated to those we don’t know well. The participants in Chopik’s study said they’d only be “a little” upset if an acquaintance canceled plans. So, if this is someone you don’t know very well, and don’t necessarily plan to, you might feel more comfortable ditching them.

What’s the occasion? 

A monthly game night and a funeral don’t carry the same significance. You can probably guess which one is acceptable to skip. The formality of the event will give you a signal on whether it’s alright to bail. “People are more likely to cancel informal things,” Chopik says.

It’s fine to bail on a coffee hang, but think twice before ditching a wedding, funeral, retirement party, or other event of importance where someone might’ve paid money for you to be there, even if you don’t necessarily deem it a monumental occasion. “If it’s super important to this person, I’ll go, I’ll move mountains, I’ll traverse seas, I’ll travel as much as possible or inconvenience myself a lot,” Chopik says. “But then if it’s more informal or you don’t know them very well and the burden to get there is high, those things are the things that’ll lead you to likely cancel.”

While it may seem acceptable to ghost on a group occasion — who would notice you’re missing anyway? — your absence might alter the vibe. Take a bachelor or bachelorette party: If five of seven invitees back out, the celebration has shifted from a group affair into an intimate gathering. “Those last two left are in such a weird situation where it’s like, now I don’t want to go as much because it’s a smaller bachelor party,” Givi says. Your bailing signals to the stragglers that the event isn’t fun enough for everyone to attend.

How annoying is it for you to attend?

How often do we schedule a hangout only to remember later how much of a burden it’ll be to get there? The costs — financial, logistical, and energetic — all factor heavily into which plans we see through. A long and expensive commute for a short, casual hang when you’re already exhausted may not seem worth it. 

The problem is, we’re bad at predicting how much fun we’ll have. We tend to overestimate the costs and underestimate how enjoyable the event might be, which leads us to cancel plans. In reality, our worst fears almost never materialize. “If you’re really anxious about it, it’s probably not going to be as bad as you expect. And that’s a pretty consistent finding,” Ella Moeck, a lecturer at Adelaide University in South Australia, tells Vox.

Everyone’s bar for what constitutes “too far” or “too much effort” varies, though. Your canceling over a 15-minute drive across town runs the risk of pissing off a friend who doesn’t consider that a hassle at all. 

Concerning money, when people have already paid up front, they’re more likely to stick with plans. In that case, canceling would create more problems instead of quelling them. “That’s why anytime I’m planning anything, especially if it involves money, I make people Venmo me weeks in advance,” Givi says, for, say, a show or concert. 

What’s your excuse?

In his study on canceling plans, Chopik found the most reasonable excuses for canceling were being sick, dealing with a family emergency or childcare issue, or having a work obligation. The worst justifications were mentioning something better came up, not being interested in the activity, and straight-up lying. 

Surprisingly, participants weren’t sympathetic when someone canceled because of financial constraints. Chopik suspects the framing matters more than anything else: “I bet if you communicated that ‘I would’ve loved to go to this concert and spend time with you…but I just really can’t squeeze this right now,’ that’s a way more understanding excuse than being like, ‘That’s too expensive. I’m not going,’” he says.

The excuses themselves carry weight, but what they signal is also crucial. By telling a friend you’re bailing on them because you’d rather hang out with someone else, you’re communicating that they might not matter to you. But if you provide clarity about why you can’t make it and try to reschedule, that’s a sign you value the relationship. “If it’s just like, ‘I’m tired,’ come on, you committed already,” Givi says.

What are the consequences?

Canceling plans comes with potential fallout. Bowing out of a recurring group event isn’t likely to ruffle many feathers, but sending a “Sorry, can’t make it!” text minutes before a dinner reservation with out-of-town family members might not fly. Think about the position you’d leave the other party in, Givi says. “You could imagine it’s probably more acceptable the more time that there is before the event, the less meaningful the event, the less it’s putting them in a bind,” he says.

But recent research suggests these social consequences may be overblown. In an unpublished study, researchers found cancelers tend to overestimate how upset others are when they back out and underestimate how much canceling impacted others. “Realizing that canceled-on persons are more understanding than expected can reduce social stress,” the authors write. 

However, this isn’t permission to back out of events with abandon. If you do leave people in a tough spot — they need to cover your concert ticket, they’re scrambling to find another way to get to an event you said you’d drive to — be prepared for scorned parties to share some choice words about you behind your back. “There’s this social penalty, too, that sometimes if you bail, people aren’t crazy about that,” Givi says.

Being in a relationship with someone — friends, family, romantic partners — requires us to honor our commitments. To be there. If we fail to uphold that simple promise, the invites will inevitably dry up. Who wants to keep making plans with someone who seemingly doesn’t value them? How can a friendship blossom when you don’t see one another? 

“If you want a friendship, you have to honor those commitments and show up,” Chopik says. “You have to honor the non-important stuff.”

Chances are good you live with another person. Over half of American adults cohabitate with their spouse or significant other. Older adults are increasingly living with roommates. Multigenerational households have more than quadrupled over the last decade. And about a third of adults under 35 live with a parent. 

If you’ve found yourself living communally at one point or another, you know that sharing space comes with its quirks and potential headaches. Who gets to use the only bathroom first in the morning? Who’s responsible for taking out the trash? Do you actually need to be friends with your roommates? 

Being a better roommate or family member isn’t just about minimizing daily annoyance — it’s about transforming your relationships and overall well-being. According to the 2025 World Happiness Report, a household of about four members is predictive of higher happiness levels and better relationships. Older adults who cohabitate are more satisfied living with others, and have higher well-being and happiness than those who live alone, research suggests.  

Whether you live with a romantic partner, roommates, parents, grandparents, or other family members, experts (including therapists, authors, friendship experts, and researchers) — who have firsthand experience of their own — have concrete tips for how to communicate, declutter, and split finances with the people you share space with. 

Responses have been edited and condensed for clarity. 

Communicate, communicate, communicate

“I will live and die on the hill of communication being the most important aspect of successfully living with other adults. That comes from my experience living with my parents in adulthood, and from working on my anthology about communal living and interdependence. If good communication can ultimately lead to progress, any challenges that come up around logistics, habits, preferences — the things people tend to think are most important to consider when sharing space with others — can be addressed. Understanding that living with other adults doesn’t require perfect compatibility, but rather a shared willingness to work at it, opens up so many doors.”

—Samantha Paige Rosen, editor of Living, Together: Reimagining Community in the Age of Disconnection

Accept everyone’s unique (and probably wrong) ways of doing chores

“How someone loads the dishwasher is the biggest differing personalities button-pusher ever. Know this. And accept it.”

—Lauren Palmer Jansen, communications coordinator for L’Arche GWDC, a community where people with and without intellectual disabilities live and work together

Get regular meetings on the calendar

“I always recommend having a designated time — weekly, monthly — for house meetings. It feels odd initially because we believe that everything with friends should happen organically. But when you’re sharing something as sacred as a home, you have to be aligned on what creates a safe and joyful experience. This also helps with any anxiety you might feel about bringing up hard topics, like washing the dishes or inviting guests over, because you have the security of knowing that there’s dedicated time to check in.”

—Danielle Bayard Jackson, friendship educator and author of Fighting For Our Friendships: The Science and Art of Conflict and Connection in Women’s Relationships

Mark your territory

“In a shared home, peace isn’t about square footage, but it’s often helped by each person having one space that’s truly their own. That single boundary, like a door you can close, is often what makes the togetherness feel like a choice you’re happy to continue making.”

—Juli Ford, multigenerational living expert and founder of Home After 50

Discuss decluttering

“Clutter is a common household stressor, and our research suggests one reason why is that people living together buy things independently but hesitate to get rid of things independently, often over-involving each other in disposal decisions. Our proposed fix: Set disposal rules up front, the same way you might set buying rules. Let each person freely toss items only they use, or create a ‘staging area’ where items sit briefly before leaving the house. People can weigh in if they want, without letting clutter linger indefinitely.”

—Peggy Liu, professor of marketing at the University of Pittsburgh School of Business, and Theresa Kwon, assistant professor of marketing at the University of Hong Kong Business School

Agree to the “uncomfortable rule”

“Roommates who want to get along will find a way to get along. The second you stop wanting to get along, the dynamics shift. Agree to the uncomfortable rule. The uncomfortable rule says that if anyone is uncomfortable, you all agree to talk about the problem and listen. This way no one needs to hide the truth when uncomfortable situations come up. This also makes it easier to have conversations instead of confrontations.”

—Harlan Cohen, author of Win or Learn: The Naked Truth About Turning Every Rejection Into Your Ultimate Success

Divide chores equitably, not equally

“Don’t divide housework equally, divide it explicitly and equitably. In an intergenerational home, people have different amounts of time, energy, and physical capacity, so the goal isn’t identical workloads but a shared agreement everyone considers fair. Use a shared system to make the work visible. Track what gets done and by whom, then check in regularly before invisible labor turns into resentment.”

—Peter Askjær Drejer, founder of Tody, a chore managing app

Get clear about money up front

“From a financial therapist perspective, one of the biggest sources of conflict in shared living situations is the meaning people attach to money, fairness, and responsibility. Talk about expectations from the very beginning. You want to reduce the possibility of resentment forming, which can often happen if there were no conversations early on discussing what is or is not acceptable behavior and what is expected of everyone within the shared space. Most often people will wait until they’re already frustrated to discuss sharing finances or household responsibilities. But it is highly unproductive to engage in a conversation when it starts emotionally charged. Instead, schedule regular check-in conversations where you discuss not only who pays for what, but also whether the current arrangement still feels fair.” 

—Kiki Jacobson, licensed mental health counselor specializing in financial therapy

Find the good in tough situations

“My best advice is to see good intentions everywhere, even if you’re experiencing bad outcomes. For the most part, no one wants to be a bad roommate, so if someone is acting in a way that’s driving you insane, you want to approach the situation as if both of you want to fix the situation. Offer help rather than accusations. And, importantly, sometimes you can help teach others how to show up to a conversation by modeling good behavior. Sometimes people just don’t know how to have a mature, helpful conversation because they’ve never done it before. Staying regulated goes a long way.”

—Katie Rose, licensed clinical social worker

Don’t compromise, get creative

“Every recurring argument is an invitation to redesign the system rather than blame the person. Stop asking who’s right and start asking, How could we make this easier? The happiest households aren’t conflict-free — they’re creative. They develop rhythms, rituals, and agreements that work for the people actually living there rather than trying to squeeze themselves into someone else’s idea of how a household should function. One person cooks while the other cleans. Mornings become a quiet zone. Everyone gets an hour alone before reconnecting. Creativity is often a far better relationship skill than compromise.”

—Jane Garnett, licensed marriage and family therapist

Invest in a white noise machine

“Get an industrial strength white noise-maker. The app on your phone won’t cut it. It needs to be the kind you find in therapy offices so you can drown out at least some of the annoying sounds around you. Keep it on all day, not just for sleeping. Buy two if needed.”

—Mary McLaughlin, licensed clinical social worker

I don’t do well with stress. Even minor inconveniences can throw me off my game, turning a mildly bad day into a complete five-alarm fire. If someone asks a single thing of me during one of these spirals, I’m likely to blow up. 

Whether you’ve woken up on the wrong side of the bed or an avalanche of calamities happens to descend upon you, it’s easy to get bogged down by negativity, to feel like a black cloud hangs over your head. Anyone who’s had a bad day can attest to how these feelings can ripple out to other aspects of your life: You’re curt with the barista and they’re rude in return; you throw your bag down forcefully at your desk and break your glass Tupperware inside; you snap at your partner and they get annoyed.

“When you’re in a bad mood, it shows up in your behavior and it shows up in your facial expressions and it shows up in your tone of voice and you might end up actually eliciting negativity from others unintentionally that way,” Ryan Martin, a psychologist who has studied anger and the author of Emotion Hacks: 50 Ways to Feel Better Fast, tells Vox.

Rather than lashing out at every unsuspecting soul who crosses your path, Martin outlines four tactics to help you defang your rage during those days when everyone at work needs something from you, your basement floods, and your best friend is mad at you.

1. Recognize that you’re crabby

When people are having a bad day, they tend to let that negativity inform how they perceive everything moving forward, Martin says. “It becomes a lens that they look through, and they start to interpret a lot of events as being negative, even neutral things,” he says. “Or they fail to recognize some of the positive things that happened along the way.”

By acknowledging I am having a bad day, you can stop the cycle of negativity and consider what concrete actions you could take to improve your mood.

2. Think about what has actually gone wrong (and what’s gone right)

One of those concrete steps is to pay attention to the things that have actually gotten under your skin and determine if they really are day-ruining, or merely inconveniences. “Part of what happens for people is when they get down…they get hung up on the things that they’re upset about, and they start to catastrophize a little bit,” Martin says. 

Be realistic and consider whether the traffic you’re in will actually cause you to lose your job, or just make you a few minutes late. (It’s entirely possible you might lose your job, and a mindset shift won’t make that less stressful!) But maybe there are other things about your day that are going well: You enjoyed your breakfast and got out the door on time. Those are worth acknowledging, too.

3. Take control where you can

On days when it seems like absolutely nothing is going your way, it can be easy to feel like bad things are happening to you in a world where you have no agency. There certainly are scenarios — say, getting a flat tire — where things are largely out of your control. But there are likely other aspects of your day where you can establish more control. Maybe it’s rescheduling a meeting and taking a walk instead. Perhaps you call a friend just to say you’re thinking of them. By doing this, you put a little space between the unpleasant events and everything else. “I like to acknowledge that those things truly are independent of each other,” Martin says. “They’re bad things that just all happened all at the same time, but it isn’t actually a pattern that is related to those things.”

Recent research has found that taking concrete steps to manage stress is effective at minimizing negative emotions and improving mental health. And these stress-management tactics don’t take a ton of time and effort either: They can look like stepping away to relax for a minute, getting a good night’s sleep, practicing gratitude, or seeking out social support. 

4. Don’t blow up

All communication skills elude me in the midst of a stressful day. Catch me at the wrong time, and I might snap. Offering a warning that you’re on edge isn’t a bad idea, but your delivery matters, Martin says. “What I don’t necessarily love is when someone essentially says, ‘Hey, I’m on the verge of a freakout,’ and then asks me to…deal with whatever mood they’re in, in a way that actually puts a lot of emotional labor on me,” he says. 

Rather than lashing out at a friend and saying, “I’m not in the mood for your jokes,” Martin suggests a softer “I’m really struggling today, just wanted you to know,” or “This day has been so awful, I’d appreciate it if you had some patience with me.”

“My take is that people are often pretty good at giving people grace when things are voiced in that way,” he says. 

Bad days, unfortunately, are inevitable. But we don’t have to make a stressful day worse. How we choose to react to stressful situations is entirely within our control. 

Here’s the problem with friendship these days: People say they have quality people in their corner, are even satisfied with the number of friends they have, and yearn to see them more often. Despite all this, Americans are actually spending less time socializing than ever before — a mere 35 minutes a day in 2025. When we do make plans, we schedule them weeks in advance. (Cue the I’m just so busy!) By the time the date finally rolls around, we might cancel, because we’re too stressed and want to veg out on the couch instead. In other words, we have very little follow through.

But we can close the gap between our wants and the constraints of reality by utilizing the resources we already have. Might I suggest the weekly photo dump? Every Friday in our group chat, my friends and I send a handful of photos from our weeks: pictures of dogs, of meals, of trails hiked, outfits worn, the stuff we wouldn’t necessarily share online. The photo dump is a peek behind the curtain, an intimate front-row seat to the small, slow moments that only your friends would appreciate.

If you’re prone to laziness, as I admittedly am, the photo dump has perhaps the highest effort-to-payoff ratio. The weekly cadence establishes a routine, and texting is a relatively low-lift means of staying in touch.

Since texting outpaced phone calls in 2008, many of us have primarily used the written word, and the occasional photo, to converse. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the amount of time we spend glued to our phones has only increased, too. Sure, we could all do with a little less screen time, but if you’ve already got your phone in hand, might as well use it for something socially engaging.

At the same time, the photo dump provides some much needed guardrails when it comes to the expectation to be always available. First, by choosing a time or day of the week for the dump, you eliminate the pressure to respond to sporadic messages that come in at all hours of the day. “Maybe a weekly call becomes a little bit harder to sustain for some people, but a weekly text message, especially if we could say ‘I saw this and it reminded me of you. Hope you’re well,’ that doesn’t create an immediate pressure to respond,” Peggy Liu, the Ben L. Fryrear endowed chair and professor of marketing at the University of Pittsburgh School of Business, told Vox.

Plus, having a routine when it comes to your social interactions makes it easier to stay in touch. If you’re already in the habit of catching up regularly, you’re less likely to completely fall out of contact, which eliminates the anxiety a lot of people feel when it comes to reaching out to a friend when it’s been a while. “Even in the age of social media when people were more likely to use it for a social networking purpose, having some sense that you knew what was happening in someone’s life actually gave you something to talk about once you saw them face-to-face or on a phone call,” Jeffrey A. Hall, a communication studies professor at the University of Kansas, told Vox.

Next, mutual buy-in helps quiet the anxious voice in the back of your mind that says you’re annoying and no one wants to see what you’ve been up to. The structure of the photo dump gives everyone permission to share. “There’s really nothing wrong with the idea of caring as being a central reason for doing all of this,” Hall said.

Texting may not be the most effective way to keep in touch — phone calls create stronger social bonds, according to one study — but it’s certainly preferable to no communication whatsoever. “It provides a sense of connection in the moment and a reminder that there are people in your life who care about you and are thinking of you,” Hall said. Take, for instance, one of Liu’s studies that found that people underestimate how much others appreciate their reaching out. Sending a picture of your garden in full bloom is a way of sharing something meaningful to you and also lets your friends know you’re thinking of them. 

The weekly photo dump is a safe space to fill your friends in beyond the prying eyes of social media. No need to hard launch to an audience who hardly knows you — sprinkle in pictures of your new fling, who they’ve probably already heard about. Your friends will value the chaotic scene of your kids’ pool party more than the internet will, and the fact that it’s not something you’re posting on Instagram makes the interaction feel that much more intimate. “The social obligation amongst five to 10 friends is a lot stronger than an obligation to [the] social media audience as a whole,” Hall said. “There’s a lot of possibilities from more meaningful and richer exchanges in that kind of context than there would be in your 500 friends on Facebook back in the day.”

My last photo dump included pictures of a friend’s cat in her fridge, my backyard looking dreamy under string lights, a manicure, a towering ice cream cone. None of these moments will be etched into the annals of history, but I feel closer to my friends having witnessed the tiny snapshots of their lives. And that’s what friendship is: being there for the small stuff.

“We know what’s going on in each other’s lives,” Hall said. “And those things are the hallmark of what it means to be in a relationship with someone.”

When Gaby Lieberman moved in with her boyfriend Elvin Pavlenko, she didn’t think she’d be so closely scrutinized by their neighbors. But from the start, she was fighting an uphill battle: Pavlenko spent his entire life on the same block in Teaneck, New Jersey; when he moved out of his childhood home, he landed…across the street, in an apartment complex where he and Lieberman lived. In other words, the neighbors had watched him grow up. “These people knew him, knew his whole story,” Lieberman tells Vox. “They had seen him in diapers all the way to a grown 30-year-old man.” And the community was protective of Pavlenko and suspicious of outsiders.

So when Pavlenko’s former schoolmate spotted Lieberman reaching into an unfamiliar car to give a man who decidedly was not Pavlenko a hug and a kiss, alarm bells went off. The neighbor, who had a reputation for being gossipy, flagged Pavlenko down in the laundromat to spill the tea. Over dinner a few days later, Pavlenko confronted Lieberman: This guy I know saw you kissing an older man with a beard. Are you cheating on me? “And I was like, what? You mean my dad?” she says.

Neighbor relationships have the potential to be either fruitful or fraught. They sit at a unique intersection of intimacy and distance: You may be geographically close to them, but they aren’t owed the same sort of emotional vulnerability as family or friends. The couple next door or the folks down the street might carry institutional knowledge of the building or neighborhood; they can help you out in a pinch and can be a pleasant source of social interaction. They can also be a little nosy, standoffish to newcomers, and, at worst, harbor biases, upping the chances for years of awkward or contentious run-ins. 

It’s well established that gossip facilitates social connection and swapping stories with a neighbor can be super beneficial in spurring collective action in your community. That’s because gossip helps you make sense of the social world, according to Francesca Giardini, an associate professor of sociology at the University of Groningen. The people living around you can help you determine the cultural norms and expectations of the neighborhood.

This exchange of information can be helpful when you’re new to the community and want to get the lay of the land, but there’s a line between useful intel and harmful judgments. The secret to effective gossip, experts say, is to be fully aware of the consequences and to know when to stop.

Clarify your goals for the conversation

Because you likely don’t have a prior relationship with the people you live around, and therefore no shared history, interests, or social circle to draw from, the content of your initial conversations will likely center on specific topics, like recommendations (Do you have a Chinese takeout spot you like?), safety (How do you deal with stolen packages?), and community norms (Can I park there?). But that can give way to gossip: That person’s selling their house, I haven’t seen so-and-so in a while. “When we’re gossiping, first and foremost, we might be signaling something about a shared understanding of these community norms or rules,” Meltem Yucel, an assistant professor of psychology at Michigan State University, tells Vox. “It signals to the listener that we… [care] about these rules.”

Because community gossip is so heavily focused on shared values and conventions, opting out can subtly signal you don’t respect the social network. “I think the one thing you don’t want to do is be the holier-than-thou person [who] says, ‘I’m not going to participate in this. I’m not a gossip. I never gossip,’” Frank McAndrew, a professor emeritus of psychology at Knox College, tells Vox. “First of all, if the only person you’re willing to talk about is yourself, everybody’s going to think you’re pretty boring. But secondly, what you’re really saying to people in that situation is ‘I don’t trust you. I don’t want to be part of your network,’ and you’re not going to win any popularity contest by doing that.” But, McAndrew continues, you need to be discerning with what you choose to share. 

So, when you’re gossiping, first consider the purpose of the conversation. Are you curious about the welfare of another neighbor? Do you want to vent about a neighbor’s annoying penchant for not picking up after their dog? What you choose to discuss should ultimately be useful to someone besides you. “If you’re planning to do construction, you’re having a big party… something that might impact their lives, then sharing this information with them might be something that would be good for your relationship with them,” Yucel says. These scenarios are generally constructive, informative, and reinforce the norms of the neighborhood. Even if you’re talking about the lazy dog owner behind their back, you’re sending a clear signal to your conversation partner that behavior isn’t acceptable. It’s a way of bonding, too, Yucel says.

But if you’re gossiping simply to cast judgments on a person or behavior that has little impact on your life, no one benefits, McAndrew says. This mean-spirited chit-chat can stem from racist or classist biases, he also pointed out. Before you start complaining about someone else, reflect on what exactly bothers you about, say, the appearance of their home, the number of people who live there, or what they spend their time and money on. “What you want to do is really examine your motives,” McAndrew says. “‘What makes me think there’s something wrong here?’ And if you’re being honest with yourself and you find out it’s really nothing more than a stereotype that you might have, then maybe you should keep your mouth shut until you know more.”

When you’re on the receiving end of gossip, try to determine the other person’s motives, too. Are they disclosing useful information that directly impacts you, or are they tarnishing someone’s reputation? Is it something they’ve observed directly or are they relaying secondhand (or thirdhand) intel? And do you agree with what they’re saying?

Weigh the consequences

As you continue to engage in gossip beyond the initial exchange of information, consider how the person on the receiving end might see you. “If the audience believes that the gossiper is motivated by self-interest or a desire to harm the person they are talking about, then they will be evaluated negatively,” Kim Peters, a social and organizational psychologist at the University of Exeter, tells Vox in an email. 

Similarly, think about the repercussions should this information trickle out to the wider community or get attributed to you. If someone confides in you, don’t share what they said without permission. But discussing something everyone can observe — a neighbor’s new car — is fair game, as long as you refrain from passing judgment on what they choose to spend money on.

As with any conversation, avoid gossiping negatively in public places — especially online. “In general, it’s always good to assume that what you said could be retold,” Yucel says. Stick to what you have observed and personally know to be true, avoid saying anything mean-spirited, and don’t put anything in writing you’d be embarrassed to see reposted or shared.

Part of this mental math has to do with the people you’re gossiping with. You might consider biting your tongue around the clueless blabbermouths who don’t have bad intentions but who repeat everything they hear, McAndrew says. Also avoid the known busybodies who hold onto information to backstab or to tear others down. Unfortunately, you might not know if any of your neighbors possess these habits until you observe them in the act, whether spilling someone else’s secrets or your own, so it’s a good idea to err on the side of caution. 

But the consequence of gossip isn’t always negative. Your goal might be for the gossip to get back to a neighbor so they change their behavior, or to warn another community member about someone who behaves badly. Similarly, if a couple of neighbors in an apartment building gossip over a shared cockroach problem that’s gone unaddressed, they can coordinate with other tenants to spur the landlord into action. 

Know when to call it quits

A skilled gossiper knows when to disengage. The signs that someone may not want to gossip with you could be fairly obvious: After the initial “Did you notice…” they aren’t active in the conversation or they try to change the subject. “Sometimes if you feel the tension or everything becomes uncomfortable, the safest option is to change the topic or explain why you are making that remark,” Giardini, the sociology professor, says. “You are trying to provide reasons that you think it’s relevant.” In other words, you’re managing your reputation. Again, if you’re veering into judgmental territory, best to pump the brakes. 

If you’re on the receiving end, think twice before feeding into gossip that seems to be turning people against another person. Instead, you can say, “Oh I have no idea what’s going on with them!” in a breezy tone before changing the subject. Simply take the information for what it is: something that could potentially be useful, but that you don’t need to perpetuate. The next time you hear loud music, you can tell the person next door that it’s the DJ who lives nearby — thanks to the intel from another neighbor — but you don’t need to tell everyone else that he’s recently divorced and in a custody battle, too. 

Of course, there will inevitably be moments when you say the wrong thing at the wrong time to the wrong person and the gossip turns sour. If someone betrayed your confidence and disclosed what you said to the subject of your chatter, you’ve now learned the hard way they probably can’t be trusted.

Or maybe you inadvertently started a rumor about someone and they’re confronting you about it. Apologizing is your only option, according to McAndrew. Because unlike other relationships where you can avoid someone forever after hurting their feelings, you can’t skirt your neighbors unless one of you moves — which is what Gaby Lieberman and Elvin, who she ended up marrying, did. 

After their neighbor told Pavlenko that he thought he saw Lieberman cheating, Pavlenko told the neighbor the comment made her uncomfortable. Now, the couple lives in a cul-de-sac in Sandy Hook, New Jersey, and the only gossip they do with their neighbors centers on the former owner of their home.

“They tell me a lot of stories about this community and the guy that lived in my house,” Lieberman says. “But they’re not gossiping about other neighbors.”

Meg didn’t want to swing, but it didn’t matter. Her friend’s kid wanted her to swing. 

What was ostensibly a hangout for Meg and her friend was quickly overtaken, as it usually is, by the kids’ desire to be entertained. On the third hour of playing with her friend’s children at a park, Meg, a 38-year-old who asked Vox not to publish her last name so she could speak freely about her friendships, received the request to join one of the kids on the swings. She was nursing a coffee and was perfectly satisfied just pushing the child, and she told them as much. “The kid totally flipped out, like, started crying, threw a fit,” Meg tells Vox. “Then my friends were looking at me in this way of, could you just sit on [the swing]? … Because then they were like, ‘We’ll sit on the swing with you.’”

It isn’t that Meg doesn’t want to interact with her friends’ kids at all, but after a few hours of entertaining them, she’s hit her limit. She also hopes to avoid seeming like she’s calling their parenting into question, but she feels the need to set a boundary with their kids, to say “no” every once in a while. But therein lies the tension: Is causing a friend’s child temporary discomfort worth it to preserve her own sanity? 

“It’s a strange tightrope to be like, I’m so fucking proud of you. You’re doing amazing,” Meg says. “But also your kids drive me nuts.”

Interacting with kids in today’s world has never been more perplexing. People are having them later, and if they do, they tend to spend much more time with them than generations past. At the same time, society can feel segregated into distinctly kid-friendly and kid-free zones, and should a child cross that boundary into an adults-only space, people on both sides have strong feelings. Given rampant American individualism and the weight placed on the nuclear family, raising children can feel like an act that happens behind closed doors and is done only by a child’s parents. 

As a result, many people — even parents themselves — are less practiced at interacting with children but may suddenly find themselves thrust into child-adjacency once someone in their lives has a kid. Unaccustomed to dealing with them and unsure of the norms, they want to avoid harming a kid or stepping on another parent’s toes. The consequences of avoiding children run the gamut: people don’t build relationships with the kids in their lives at all, they botch any interaction they have with kids, or they come to consider them public nuisances. 

“There’s greater anxiety about boundaries, about judgment, about liability, especially,” Annie Pezalla, a developmental psychologist and teaching professor at the University of St. Thomas, tells Vox. “Interacting with kids feels a lot less intuitive than it once did, and a lot of adults feel quite uncomfortable interacting with kids.”

Often, we’re left with more questions than answers. Is it rude to tell a kid not to touch your game console or tchotchkes when they’re in your home? What should you do if they don’t listen? Is it okay to be judgmental of other kids’ behavior (and of their parents’ unwillingness to intervene) in public? Is it ever appropriate to say something? 

Taking a more honest and communal approach to parenting benefits everyone: kids, parents, and non-parents alike. By establishing boundaries and getting into the habit of interacting with children, we all can feel more comfortable living in a multi-generational society. Here’s what parenting and etiquette experts have to say about dealing with three common types of kids.

The kid who’s misbehaving

The eternal issue with “kids these days” is that they aren’t being brought up the same way as other generations were. You may have heard of gentle parenting, a newly common and well-intended approach that focuses more on boundaries and understanding than punishment. Instead of correcting a child’s behavior with directives, adults acknowledge their feelings and motivations and give them choices. Overly permissive versions of the practice, however, have enabled children to “rule the roost,” Pezalla, who has studied gentle parenting, says. (Proponents say it still involves “positive discipline,” setting expectations, and maintaining boundaries.) Instead of telling a kid not to throw toys at another kid, gentle parents might try to explain to their toddler why they feel the urge to chuck stuffed animals. “The priority of gentle parents is emotion regulation of their children and also themselves,” Pezalla says. “The last thing that they wanted was to flip their lid, was to yell, or was for their kid to yell in a public place.”

But kids don’t do well with this kind of subtlety, Pezalla says; she argues that, in fact, they learn more when an adult raises their voice or is visibly angry. Seeing an adult’s emotional reaction is how they know they’ve crossed a line. This doesn’t give adults carte blanche to be rude or mean to children. Instead, it can help to have established boundaries with your friends who are parents: I know kids have a lot of energy, but I’d really appreciate it if you asked your kids not to jump on the furniture. 

And if you’re hosting a family dinner and your nieces and nephews are running amok, a stern “Don’t touch that vase — go play outside” gets the message across and is well within your rights. “Kids are very used to having to learn the different rules for different environments, and in fact, that’s a part of learning and growing up and realizing we don’t behave at the grocery store the way we behave in our playroom,” Lizzie Post, co-author of Emily Post’s Etiquette: The Centennial Edition, tells Vox. If you’re welcoming someone else’s children into your space, it’s appropriate to set the rules and expectations. And if parents can’t wrangle their child, or refuse to, maybe you hang out at their house or a park in the future. 

But your stepping in is just as likely to be welcomed by exhausted parents. In her research, Pezalla has found that parents are often grateful when other adults lightly discipline their kids. This materialized in her own life when a neighbor told her 12-year-old twin boys to stop climbing on construction equipment. “I was like, thank you so much,” Pezalla says. “Please proceed in yelling at them. If you see them up on there again, yell at them and feel free to text or call me.”

Lisa Sibbett, author of the Substack The Auntie Bulletin, has carved out a role for herself as one such adult. An auntie, Sibbett explains, is an adult deeply invested in the rearing and well-being of a child they may or may not be related to. “One of the real marks of an experienced auntie is that we’re comfortable getting other people’s kids in trouble,” she tells Vox. “And there are some kids in our lives where we are fully authorized to do that.”

The kid who can’t be left alone

In 2024, the motherhood and “slow living” influencer Bethany Fontaine posted what she considered an unpopular opinion: Children should spend more time with their parents than with their friends, teachers, or coaches. While most people would agree with this sentiment generally, the post seemed to resonate most with a growing proportion of parents who’d rather keep their kids on a short leash, which, in turn, might breed kids who feel increasingly uncomfortable entertaining themselves. One estimate found that young Gen X parents spent 52 percent more time with their kids than boomer parents.

As Meg has witnessed firsthand with many of her friends, “their parenting style is to pretty much be with the kids 24/7 and just make sure they’re not feeling left out in any kind of way,” she says. She’s been hesitant to address the clinginess with her friends because it feels like a referendum on their parenting. Her way around any awkwardness is to give her friends a heads-up that she loves their kids, she’s happy they’re here, but she might need to step away at some point if she gets overwhelmed by them. “I’ve seen when I’ve said no to their kids, the kids blow up because they’re not used to it,” Meg says. “And then later that day, I notice the kids will…seem more centered and calm around me, as if they feel safe around a person with boundaries.”

It’s unrealistic to expect anyone’s kids will be entirely absent if you’re entering into their home, and creating space for children will likely make it easier to continue to see your friends after they become parents, but parents should also give kids space to play by themselves or to be cared for by another adult, Post says. “When I was growing up, you did not interrupt Mom if she had a friend over,” she says. “We always had to say, ‘Excuse me.’ You don’t just come up and demand this person’s attention, and you give adults space.” 

Post suggests setting expectations with your friends on which hangouts are adults-only and encourages parents to respect that their friends may not want to hang out with their kids all the time. “Personally, and not having children, I do really appreciate my friends who try to balance that out,” she says. It also means parents might need to be intentional in setting aside dedicated time to spend time with their friends beyond when their kid is at school or dance class.

The kid having a meltdown in public

It’s a fear among many parents: their progeny completely loses it at a restaurant or in a store. That, somehow, everyone else’s kids are better behaved than their own. “That’s a deep, serious existential fear for parents: People aren’t going to like my kids, people aren’t going to want to be around my kids. Rather than experience their children being rejected, they would rather cocoon in their own home,” Sibbett says. But when kids cease to exist in public spaces, the rest of the world forgets kids are loud and messy and a little bit chaotic, and they might lose their tolerance for coexisting with them altogether. So banning kids from public spaces (or expecting their parents to not bring them to the grocery store or to Target) isn’t a practical or kind solution. 

If you see a kid completely melting down in a public place, experts agree it’s best to hold your tongue unless there’s an issue of safety: the kid is about to run into oncoming traffic, they’re knocking glass jars off the shelf in the grocery store, etc. 

In the event that a child you don’t know is doing something that directly affects you personally  — maybe they’re pulling your hair while standing behind you in line — Post suggests addressing the parent and asking them to tell their child to stop. “I think that when kids truly misbehave in a way that is invading another person’s space like that, where you’re kicking something I am sitting on, you’re throwing something that hits me, I think you have actually quite a lot of standing to be able to say knock it off,” Post says. 

But if a baby or toddler is screaming in public and they aren’t invading your personal space, you simply have to deal with it. It’s part of existing in the world with other people. “Everybody’s kid is a little bit of a monster — and I say that with deep affection,” Sibbett says. “Children are just not socialized to act like adults. And so they make big messes and they make big noises and they have tantrums.”

In all kid contexts, we could stand to have a little more grace for one another, Pezalla says: grace for the parents who are trying their best, grace for people without kids who aren’t as familiar with the specifics of your child’s schedule and temperament, grace for the kids themselves who are living with big emotions.

“All that we can do is to lean in toward more of that old-fashioned intergenerational caregiving space where we just all have eyes on each other’s kids and where there’s more of an acknowledgement of the messiness of caretaking children,” she says.

Have questions about how to navigate specific social situations involving other people’s kids? Send a note to allie.volpe@voxmedia.com and we may address your dilemma in a future article.