When did people answering questions on TV start to begin every answer with "Well..."?

[karlrschneider]

Is this recent?...or did I just never notice before?

I thought about it a couple days ago and have been closely watching and listening since. Almost without exception,
every response starts with that word and a very brief or occasionally pregnant pause.

[Bonhomme Richard]

1. Probably Reagan. Well............n/t

[Booster]

2. WE GOT A WINNER! ! ! ! Well, there you go again.

[karlrschneider]

5. You're right, I'd forgotten his penchant for doing that.

:-)

[MnFats]

3. they're coached to do that, it gives them a moment to try, often futilly, to come up..

..with a coherent answer.

they often use 'Thank you for asking that question, Brit:" for the same purpose.
there are others, too. watch closely and you'll pick them up....

by the way, in Bush's case this practice gives time for someone to feed him an answer to the speaker in his ear.

[rpannier]

4. It's a way to give the person being interviewed a chance to collect their thoughts

it makes them sound like they're engaged and for some reason, it gives them the appearance of being somewhat more authoritative.

scrub doesn't do that very often and he sounds like a moron when he misspeaks.