One of the simplest and most effective ways to brighten someone’s day is by asking them a question.

Why it matters: We have dozens and dozens of conversations throughout our days — on the drive to drop off our kids at school, around the office or at a dinner party.

• But we don’t necessarily realize that almost all of those chats would be more meaningful and fulfilling with the addition of really good questions.

Case in point: “I’ll be leaving a party or some gathering and I’ll realize: That whole time, nobody asked me a single question,” author and journalist David Brooks writes in a recent New York Times column.

• “I estimate that only 30 percent of the people in the world are good question askers. The rest are nice people, but they just don’t ask. I think it’s because they haven’t been taught to and so don’t display basic curiosity about others.”

Zoom out: The finding from a Harvard Business School analysis of multiple studies is simple — people like those who ask more questions.

• That’s because being asked about ourselves and our lives makes us feel listened to, understood, cared for and validated.

Zoom in: Here are three tips to hone your question-asking skills.

• Listen to kids, Brooks notes. As we get older, we get more cautious with our questions because we don’t want to pry. But kids will ask big questions without thinking twice, like, “What are you most afraid of?”
• Surprise people. People are used to — and maybe even bored of — talking about the same big topics, like work or school. Ask them about something they rarely get to chat about.
• “I once asked a group, ‘What’s your favorite unimportant thing about you?’ I learned that a very impressive academic I know has a fixation on trashy reality TV,” Brooks writes.
• Follow up. That’s how a question turns into a conversation.

Here's a slice of life from Finish Liner Ralph T. in Tofino, British Columbia, Canada.

• "A good supply of firewood beats the winter blues."