I came upon an article in the July 2018 ABA Journal (volume 104) entitled, “Sounds of Silence” by Philip N. Meyer (pp. 22-23.)  ( “ABA Article”).

The ABA article notes that a pause at the right moment can be a very powerful tool. It cites an oral argument in which the issue was whether the police had waited long enough after knocking before entering an apartment to execute a search warrant. The police had waited 25 seconds which the defense argued was insufficient.  To make the point, counsel for the District of Columbia, started the oral argument by stating, “May it please the court….”. He then paused, precisely for 25 seconds, which to everyone else seemed like an eternity. As the  appellate judges were about to break the very uncomfortable silence, counsel began to speak, noting that the silence was the same 25 seconds that his client had waited before entering the apartment. Counsel had made his point and won the appeal. (Id. at 22.)

An article cited in the ABA Article discusses the different uses of silence. In “’Talk  Less’: Eloquent Silence in the Rhetoric of Lawyering”, Bret Rappaport, (67 Journal of Legal Education 286-314 (No. 1, 2017), (“Journal”) discusses one type of silence, or what the Greeks called “Eloquent Silence”: “… the nonspeaker intends to be communicative by her silence, or… to make an argument.” (Id. at 292.)

On a cognitive level, silence or pauses are important as they allow the brain to process and “think” about what is being said. While our System 1 thinking is automatic and thus does not require silence (and is also prone to mistakes), our System 2 being deliberative, slow, and methodical, needs the silence in which to work; It needs to take in what is being said and then process and evaluate it. ( Id at 294-296.) He cites one study which showed that the longer a teacher paused between asking a question and picking a student for an answer, the more positive and thoughtful were the responses. (Id. at 294-297, 296.):

Silence slows things down (triggering System2), allowing more effective learning to take place. …Think time allows the listener to make connections and detect patterns… -and wait time allows for personal, purposeful, meaningful and relevant learning. Silence is wait time’s solitary ingredient. (Id at 296-7.)

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