How to Avoid Awkward Holiday Conversations

I’m hosting Thanksgiving for my extended family this year, and I want it to be restorative and fun.

To set the mood, I’ll have my customary scratch-off tickets at every place setting. And I’ll ask a few questions that people can answer while we eat, like: What’s your unconventional love language?

My father, for example, will admit that his is giving warnings. If he notices something amiss — my overflowing gutters, an aching knee I’m ignoring — he’ll warn that if I don’t take action, I’m “in for a world of hurt.”

For my dad, scaring is caring. “It’s your funeral,” another one of his favorite phrases, means “I love you.”

I’m hoping this question leads to interesting conversations among my family members. We’re not likely to fight about politics (my colleague Catherine Pearson wrote about families who are). But awkward moments happen.

Prepping a few talking points before a holiday gathering may seem forced, said Alison Wood Brooks, a professor at the Harvard Business School and the author of “Talk: The Science of Conversation and the Art of Being Ourselves.” But in her research, Dr. Brooks found that just 30 seconds of brainstorming ahead of time improved the flow of conversation.

I talked to Dr. Brooks and other experts about how to have conversations at your next get-together that are, as Dr. Brooks writes, “rich, juicy and fun.”