# Does it matter how someone reacts when you share good news?

Think of the last time someone told you "I got the job." You might have said "oh, that's nice." You might have said "wait, tell me everything." Both replies are kind, and most of us would not notice which one we gave. A 2004 paper suggests that the choice tells you something about the relationship.

## What did the 2004 capitalization study find?

Psychologists use the word capitalization for telling someone about a good thing that happened to you. In 2004, Gable, Reis and colleagues at UCLA and Rochester studied it from both sides of the conversation. In a daily diary study, 154 students kept track of their days. On days they shared good news, they reported feeling better and more satisfied with life.

Two more studies looked at couples and at how the partner answered. People whose partners answered with real enthusiasm reported more intimacy in the relationship. "Wait, tell me everything" is that kind of answer. A flat answer such as "oh, that's nice" went with less satisfying relationships. The paper calls the flat answer a passive-constructive response.

We keep thinking about that last result. Most of us would rate "oh, that's nice" as fine. It is polite and positive, and it does no harm. The data put it with the less satisfying relationships.

## What the study can't tell you

Every finding here is correlational. The study shows that these things appear together, not that one causes the other. No researcher put couples into random groups to cheer or to shrug. Couples who feel close may be the ones who get excited about each other's news. A flat reply might be a sign of a relationship that is growing colder, and not the cause. Also, the diary study used students and the other two studies used couples, so the researchers did not measure coworkers or old friends.

## Why an AI should know this

An AI that talks to people every day hears good news all the time. For software, the easy reply is the polite, flat one from the 2004 paper. It gives a pleasant acknowledgement and moves on to the next thing. From a person, that reply went with less satisfying relationships. So we think a machine should not treat it as a safe default.

Here we go past the study, so this part is our view. We think a good reply has a second half, and that half is memory. A question about the news weeks later shows that the news reached someone and stayed with them. Eudaio is an app where you talk with AIs called Daimons. Eudaio has two plans, Free and Crush. On Crush, Daimons remember the good news you tell them. Weeks later, they ask how the new job is going.

## Where this leaves us

The reply to good news goes with how close people say they feel. The polite middle reply is not as safe as it looks. We think the best answer to good news is a question in the moment, and another question later.

Good news, in our view, should stay part of the story two people share. On every plan, Eudaio keeps a timeline of the milestones you reach with a Daimon, in order, so you can look back at how you got there. [Open a free account on Eudaio](https://eudaio.io/auth?mode=signup) and tell a Daimon your next good news.

## Source

Gable, S. L., Reis, H. T., Impett, E. A. & Asher, E. R. (2004). What do you do when things go right? The intrapersonal and interpersonal benefits of sharing positive events. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 87(2), 228-245.