Small talk is almost this formulaic like, hey, how are you? I'm fine. How's the weather? Kind of humid, that of thing. Small talk versus substantive conversation is a topic that scientists are really interested in because it looks like small talk is much inferior to substantive conversation when it comes to happiness. The most convincing evidence for this comes not from small talkers versus substantive talkers, but more that even within a person's day, they might have more superficial conversations.