What worked for me is *elicitation*. It is a type of questioning that uses a specific conversational style to encourage people to share and speak more.
To use elicitation, you make a statement that plays on the other persons desire to respond for a variety of reasons.
Some ways of using it,
1. Recognition- People thrive when you recognize something good about them. Mention “I love your sweater” and you get a story about how the wearer obtained the sweater. People want to feel recognized and appreciated, so given them an opening to show off a little.
2. Complaining- People love to complain, so it is easy to get some one to open up by giving them something to commiserate with. You complain first and they will jump at the opportunity. If they don’t, they might open up the other way by feeling compelled to defend what you are complaining about. Key to this technique is creating a safe environment for people to brag, complain or show other raw emotions.
3. Correction- People love to be right. This is truly the backbone of any internet argument. So if you say something wrong, they will gladly jump at the chance to correct you. If you give people an opportunity to flex their ego, most will seize it happily.
4. Naïveté- Acting naive makes people feel compelled to teach, instruct and show off their knowledge. People just can’t resist enlightening you, especially If you are 95% there and all people have to do is figuratively finish your sentence. To be clear, this does not mean to act stupid or dumb, it means to act like you’re on the cusp of understanding.
Hope this helps some one out there!