Nothing specific; it has to tailor to the individual and situation.
"Are you feeling okay?" "How's your day [week/party/new job] been going?" "What's on your mind?" "Anything interesting going on with you?" "What're you having for lunch?" (You will note this has absolutely nothing to do with the concept of "how are you?" But it's a neutral question, that allows for either a brief, meaningless answer, or an opening for discussion--"I had a burger for lunch because I'm feeling anemic and tired this week" or "nothing, yet; we're so swamped with the McGuffin project I won't get a break until six.")
The key issue is to avoid questions that have programmed standard responses. "How are you" is the worst of these. "How's it going?" is about as bad. So's "Everything okay?"--which is what parents use to check up on children; it triggers a response-pattern of well, I'm not bleeding and nothing's broken or on fire, so everything must be okay.
no subject
"Are you feeling okay?"
"How's your day [week/party/new job] been going?"
"What's on your mind?"
"Anything interesting going on with you?"
"What're you having for lunch?" (You will note this has absolutely nothing to do with the concept of "how are you?" But it's a neutral question, that allows for either a brief, meaningless answer, or an opening for discussion--"I had a burger for lunch because I'm feeling anemic and tired this week" or "nothing, yet; we're so swamped with the McGuffin project I won't get a break until six.")
The key issue is to avoid questions that have programmed standard responses. "How are you" is the worst of these. "How's it going?" is about as bad. So's "Everything okay?"--which is what parents use to check up on children; it triggers a response-pattern of well, I'm not bleeding and nothing's broken or on fire, so everything must be okay.