Talking shop: An exploration of how talking about work affects our initial interactions

•Shows how differences in word use by conversation topics affect conversation partners.•Refines theory concerning aversions to making new work connections.•Utilizes multisource field and laboratory experiments.•Suggests how our words and topics affect our conversation partners. This paper explores the linguistic cues that distinguish conversations about work topics from conversations about non-work topics and how those differences affect conversation partners. Using an exploratory analysis of a field experiment in a large U.S. technology firm, we generate hypotheses that when the conversations topic is work, people use more words associated with achievement, which makes them seem less supportive and attentive to their conversation partners. Subsequently, conversation partners are less interested in future interactions. We then test and largely confirm our hypotheses by analyzing data from a laboratory experiment. This research illuminates one potential reason why some new connections persist while others do not and suggests how people might have interactions that endure beyond a first encounter.