About greeting "How are you doing?"?

Question

It has come to my attention more recently that sometimes that a person says "How are you doing?" and I would say "Good. How are you?" That they don't respond even though they're right in front of you. Is this because of social conditioning of saying How are you doing as a form of "Hi" or do people not expect a response?

Answer 1

It's more of a hi.  I don't think people actually want an answer.  I usually just say good, though- no matter what my mood.  Like Hi, how's it going?  I say "good"...every single time.  It's like saying hi back.

Answer 2

Good observation. Now try some variation of answers. Fist repeat exactly the question . Two answer yours again . three make up a new one. Seems some use greetings as a social code . Dont you agree?

Answer 3

It think, with some, it's a game they play.  Like, I ask you how you're doing, and if you ask me back, I can show you I don't have to answer you.  In a way, they are showing you they are a bit tougher than you.

Answer 4

I never thought about it.  Now that it's been brought up it makes me think of how a greet people with that salutation and then never really bother to listen to their answer.  Wow.  It's always been something that I greeted people with.  I never thought it would be because of social conditioning or anything like that.  I guess it simply means hi to me.

Answer 5

I don't think a response is expected and that it's just said as a general greeting.  Honestly, can you imagine if you responded with, "well, my wife just left me, my dog ran away, I just got fired and I think I may have a communicable disease"  ???

No one wants to really know how you are doing, believe me...it's just another way of saying "HI".

Answer 6

Even more curious perhaps, I noticed living in Victoria, Australia, that when you greet a person with "G'day" or "hey" or "Hi" that the common response is "Fine thanks" or "Good! and you?"

Does this seem presumptuous since you didn't quite enquire as to their well being, you just greeted them? Or is it a quirky little pleasantry?

Answer 7

this isn't really an answer, but more of a comment.

There are different levels of "how you doing?"

When you ask it in the hall to a coworker you hardly know, it is different then a close friend.   So people, even strangers have ways of asking How you doing, and they really seem to mean it, versus just asking to be nice.

It is a good example of how words on there own don't have meaning.  Body language and tone also change the meaning of these words.