Many people ask questions they don't want the answers to. The question "How are you?" is a specific type of social interaction where there is an expected answer and that isn't to actually explain how you are. There are a lot of unspoken rules (such as saying yes when a person in authority asks/tells you to do something). A person with functioning social skills recognizes that a different approach is needed if they actually need to say no to their manager. Or that they need to seek guidance to see if they should be placing that higher on their priorities.