Have you heard that when talking in a group, and it gets quiet, it’s invariably at 20 minutes after the hour? I recently heard of this phenomenon from my brother-in-law, and apparently it’s a thing, since I just came across this passage in the book I’m reading:
They were there, okay, she lost in smoke, and everybody gathered around, seeming somewhat mopey, mooning, with no good talk going on… But maybe I just arrived at twenty after or twenty till when the silence-spreading angel passes overhead.
Curious about it, I googled the phenomenon to see if any research has actually been done on it. Spoiler alert: According to this article on the HowStuffWorks website, Does a hush really pass over a crowded room 20 minutes after the hour?: “it might be more of a myth or superstition rather than observable group behavior patterns.”
With that said, there’s a lot of hedging language in that conclusion: “it might be” and “more of a” and “myth or superstition.” And with that said, I don’t see any cited research on it on scholar.google.com.