A groundbreaking study from University of Latvia linguistics department reveals meaningful pauses and averted eye contact comprise nearly nine-tenths of everyday Latvian communication. 'What we initially coded as conversational gaps are actually grammatical structures,' explains lead researcher while staring at the floor.

Dr. Māra Kalniņa's team spent three years analyzing typical Latvian conversations and discovered that 87% of communication occurs in silence.

'We found that a three-second pause before answering 'yes' actually means 'yes, but with reservations,'' Dr. Kalniņa explained. 'A five-second pause means 'absolutely not, but I'm too polite to say so.'

The study also identified several key non-verbal components: - Looking at shoes: general agreement - Looking at the sky: profound disagreement - Looking at a tree: changing the subject - Extended silence: either deep contemplation or waiting for the other person to leave

'This explains so much,' said study participant Jānis Liepa. After a long pause, he added: 'Or does it?'