Smoke and Mirrors. The Art of Answering Questions.

This interesting article posted by the Harvard Business Review discusses the merits of the eloquent speaker versus the straightforward one. So, you're asked a question that you don't really know the answer to...What should you do? This study tries to provide some insights on that very question by showing audiences a video of a political debate. The first one shows the candidate answering the question asked. The second, where he answers a similar, but not exact question, and a third where he answers a completely different question.

Two things happened. First, people didn't even notice that there were differences in the answers given. Second, researchers found that audiences, "liked him better if he answered a similar question well than if he answered the actual one less eloquently." Take what you will from this, but it may be safe to argue when you don't have the exact answer to a question, at least pretend that you do!

Read the full article here.