True. Although, you (or, well, the OP, or whoever is doing the asking) are the one intruding with personal questions, that are most likely lead-ups to accusations or the asking for a favor. So maybe this is one case where we should cut the other person some slack in the rudeness department.
Is there a name for the annoying habit some people have of not answering questions?
That’s an interesting question.
Why do you want to know?
I’m rather busy today.
You need to finish what you were working on.
Hey! Look over there!
Seconding this. I can be Martha, too. And if someone doesn’t knock it off with the chit-chat after the third one-syllable answer I give them, I will slap them with a trout. No jury will convict me.
In fairness, I’m not Martha all the time. Although, some are, such as the person I described in this here OP a while ago. An extreme example, I grant you, but still: That’s at least one full-time Martha that I’ve observed. It seems to piss most people off, but IMO it can be quite nice, depending on the person.
It should be noted that I am a Scandinavian. We’re not exactly known for being overly verbose. (Although, damn it, there are also those who seem to have made it their life’s mission to go against the laconic stereotype as much as they can.)
even sven: I see nothing wrong with that series of responses. It isn’t a “conversation”, but it works for what is seems to be intended.
This “not answering simple questions” is a large part of my existence. E.g., I once asked Mrs. FtG if some pants someone had given her needed to washed. She then proceeded to tell me the saga of the pants. Umm, a “yes” or “no” is all I wanted and of course I had to stop her and ask her pointedly the original question.
“Do you know where the X is?”
“What do you want it for?”
<blink>
How can people possibly view annoying people like this as part of positive social interaction?
Happens over and over with almost all people. If you want to tell a tale, start off with answering the question!
Its call “men”
or actually husbands
I guess that might be because they pretend they are going deaf or they truly are tuning you out…
My cousin’s ex boyfriend is a BIT TIME question avoider-He doesnt answer to anyone, even to himself!
Well, one flavor of question that irritates me is:
“Why don’t you like [whatever]?”
If somebody says they don’t like broccoli, football, “MAS*H”, ketchup on hot dogs, etc., that’s the end of it. Most of the time there is no ‘why.’ They don’t like it, and that’s the end of it.
But not every situation is a conversation. I’ll (rarely) speak on the phone with clients when I can save them time/money by fixing a situation for them.
I’ll ask, “Is the widget black or white?” Now, there are three answers possible here; black, white, or cannot answer (say due to visual impairment).
But I’ll get, “My sister in Arizona had this happen back in”.
“No, I just need to know if the widget is black or white”.
“It’s been so hot the past few”.
“Sorry, but that’s extraneous info here, is the widget black or white?”
“Isn’t widget a funny wo”
“But is it black or white?”
“I’m such a clutz sometimes.”
I hang up phone
A few minutes later, Stacy comes back to my office. “Mrs Brown is on line three. She said she was about to tell you the widget is black, but her call got cut off.”
Agreed completely. In the workplace I’ve coached some people to answer yes or no questions with a yes or a no, and then a followup. e.g. Yes, and. No, but.
Bad:
“Were you able to follow up with Bob from accounting?”
“Well, what you need to understand is this other team did this, and my laptop did that, and the moon was in retrograde…”
Good:
“Are you still running into roadblocks for your project?”
“Yes, and I’m waiting on Bob to get back to me, I left him a voicemail a few hours ago and I’ll check with him again after lunch.”
If someone’s looking for a specific piece of information, start off by giving that specific piece and then any clarification or followup that’s warranted. My arms are full of dirty laundry and I’m going downstairs, I ask if you have any laundry you want me to add, either say yes or no, don’t tell me a story.
Obviously if the question is invasive, unrelated to anything that’s going on, then some evasion may be warranted – no one expects that everyone should answer everything from everyone at all times – but I think the OP’s frustration, and mine, is when in-context questions that can be answered briefly end up with a story instead, especially when the asker is not in a situation to have a nice chat about how the pants got dirty. Just say “Yeah, here are some pants, thanks for doing laundry.”
Is there a name for the annoying habit some people have of not answering questions?
Yes it’s called “wife-talk”
ME: Do you want me to call our son?
Wife: He’s hasn’t told me what he wants to do. He might be helping a friend later and he’s supposed to work tomorrow.
ME:?
And then there’s the flip side - - - -
Me: Hey, you seem upset about something. What’s Wrong?
Wife: Nothing.
My husband sometimes does this, and he says it’s because he has to go through the process of remembering. His “rambling” is really just his train of thought as he thinks his way through to the answer. Sometimes I think he’s going to get there and then he’s essentially forgotten what the question is on the way there, and I have to do the, “That’s great, but what I asked you was…” Sometimes he says that he gave the answer he did because he thought my first question was a lead-on into a hidden question or that it was part of some larger thing he assumed I was really asking about (like the cupboard height question mentioned previously - he might extrapolate that I was planning to paint something around it which is why I need the height, and so starts rambling on about paint stuff when I just needed the cupboard height). He still hasn’t caught on to the fact that I only ask what I actually mean.
Coworkers do this at work sometimes and these days I have no qualms about interrupting and re-asking the question until they give me a straight answer. I have someone waiting for the response and I don’t need to know all this extraneous stuff, all I need to know is the answer to my question. Like lno says, the best course of action is to answer the question immediately and then load all the ifs and buts afterwards if they’re really pertinent.
evasion
deflection
non-responsiveness
question dodging
See, there you go: It only took thirty posts of prose before someone answered the damned question. 
OP: Are you going to the Rotary Club meeting tonight?
Person: No.
Sometimes leads to:
OP: No? Just “no?” What kind of an answer is that? Are you going to explain your reasons, or just give me a passive-aggressive “no?”
I got called on doing that once. we were saddling up for a motorcycle ride.
Him: “How much gas do you got?”
Me: “Eh, I need to get some.”
Him: “That’s not what I fucking asked you!”
Me: “Half a tank.”
verbal diarrhea
I don’t think there is a name for them but they drive me batshit crazy.
Now, when we are talking between friends, during dinner or something like that I have no problem with it, we’re just talking.
In a work context on the other hand…
“Peter, did you change this field from int to string?”
“Err, look, it’s like this, I had to add new records and then the user called and asked for…”
“Did you change it or not?”
“Well, you know, when the other day they called and asked for…”
(Kills Peter)
What gets my goat, has always gotten my goat, and will continue to get my goat for the rest of my life, is the habit people have of asking personal, intrusive questions as small talk, and then thinking I’m the asshole for not wanting to answer.
Person I’ve known for two minutes: “Where do you live? Where did you go to school? Are you married? Do you have kids? Tell me about every job you’ve ever had.”
Me: “Fuck off. That’s my private life. There’s no reason for you to ask me about any of this. You don’t even care, it’s just chit-chat to you. But now I suddenly have to reveal every aspect of my existence to you, a complete stranger, because that’s the social norm?”
Person: “You’re an asshole.”
Me: googles possible different planets to live on
I think it can be short attention span and/or narcissism as well. They mostly hear the question, pick a key word out of it, and start blabbing about themselves.
This one seems simple enough to explain. Peter is in trouble, or thinks he is, and instantly goes to priority no. 1: Covering his ass.