How should you reply to the question, "how are you?" when you&

[cliveandrews]

Title is self-explanatory. How should you reply to questions of your well-being when things are bad?

[Robert Baratheon]

Since nobody who asks the question at my work or when I enter a business actually cares how I am, I typically reply with a terse "Hello." That way I'm still responding in a friendly way but discouraging a really stupid social trend.

[softwareNerd]

Title is self-explanatory. How should you reply to questions of your well-being when things are bad?

It really depends on who the person is. With someone you hardly know, the phrase means "Hello!" With a slightly better acquaintance, it is "Hello!" most days, but it is also an invitation to share a bit of a status update, occasionally.

If things are going particularly good or bad, you might say so to someone who is an acquaintance. Your question suggests that you do not want to share that things are bad, but you wonder if it is right to lie with "I'm doing good". Is that true?

[Nicky]

"How are you?" (or a variation like "are you well?") functions as a tentative invitation to have a conversation, in every language I know of.

The reason to start with this question, rather than "Do you want to stop and talk about XY?" or "Do you want to do XY?, is because it gives the other person

1. a chance to avoid the conversation/ reject any kind of invitation without an abrupt no (Replying to "How are you?" with "Fine, but busy" is a more gentle rejection than replying "No, I'm busy."), or

2. share their general mood, depending on which you engage further or back off.

3. Give them a chance to send out any number of other, more subtle social cues that inform the other party of the direction the encounter should go in.

[JASKN]

If indeed your reason for creating this thread is because you are uncomfortable lying to strangers, my question is: why?

Take just one example: You have a very strict time commitment today and you literally do not have time for chitchat. To answer by alluding to your stressful day is only going to make things worse for you. It is better to lie, and say, "Fine," while politely and rapidly steering the conversation to where you need, in order to make it on time.

More broadly, though, if you have good reason to suspect that telling the truth is going to be worse for you in a social interaction than telling a lie, you should lie. Everybody does this already, anyway, in the form of withholding some truth and emphasizing other truth in order to get what they are after in a social exchange. "Brad's tie is... Colorful." "Brad's tie is ugly." "Brad is a nice guy." Different personal social strategies for different situations and different personalities, on both ends.