One of the choices which the therapist has when he receives no verbal response to the embedded questions is to select one of the family members and to identify him by name, requesting his response. Again, notice that, even after identifying the family member, the therapist is delicate in his questioning, using the embedded question first, I'm curious whether you can .... Furthermore, the therapist uses another important pattern as he becomes more direct in his attempt to gather information — the pattern of polite commands (conversational postulates).[3] The therapist wants Dave, the father/husband, to respond to the embedded questions he has been asking. However, rather than directly stating a command for example:

Dave, tell me, specifically, what you . . . ,

the therapist asks Dave a question,

Can you tell me, specifically, what you . . .

Again, later, after Dave has responded, the therapist uses the same form — the polite command (conversational postulate):

Dave, can you tell me one thing that is missing for you?

The important thing about this pattern is that, although what the therapist says has the form of a question which could be answered legitimately by a simple yes or no, it has the force of a command. Consider a common, everyday example: You and a friend are in the same room; the telephone rings, and your friend glances up at you and says,

Can you answer the phone?

This sentence has the form of a simple question which requires only a yes or no answer, yet the typical response to it is for you to answer the phone. In other words, you will respond to this question as though your friend had made a direct request of you,

Answer the phone.

The use of the yes/no form of a question in cases such as this is the polite way of making a direct request. Again, the therapist, by skillfully employing this pattern, leaves the family member maximum freedom to respond.

We return, now, to the transcript.

Therapist: Yes, Dave; can you tell me one thing that is missing for you?

Dave: I want some things for myself and I really feel that my family needs some things, too.

Therapist: Can you tell me what some of those things are?

The therapist has begun the task of coming to understand how Dave wants to change. He will repeat this process with each of the family members. In order to be effective in family therapy, the therapist needs to understand both what resources the family presently acknowledges and uses, and also on what expectations the family can agree — the desired state of the family system toward which they agree to work. Each and every verbal and non-verbal exchange with family members gives the therapist information to understand the present state of the family system and at the same time it gives the family members an opportunity to learn. By skillful communication, the therapist, from the very beginning, helps the family members to develop a reachable goal for their changes — the desired state. In this particular case, the therapist is asking the male parent what he wants — what changes in the family would be acceptable for him, what he wants for himself and for his family. Dave attempts to respond; he says,

. . . like some things are missing. . .

. . . want some things for myself. . .

. . . need some things, too ....

The therapist's ears need to be tuned, to be open to detect those parts of the verbal messages which do not pick out specific parts of the speaker's world of experience. If the therapist is willing not to assume that he understands the generalities which he hears, he can make some meaning of them. Specifically, rather than assuming that his concept of the generalities being spoken is the same as the family member intends to communicate, the therapist can take the time and energy to determine more precisely the message from the person with whom he is working. The therapist may accomplish this in a graceful and sincere way by asking the other person to specify exactly to what he is referring when he uses those generalities.

It is important for us to emphasize that, while the therapist is using the pattern of language assumptions (presuppositions), embedded questions and polite commands (conversational postulates) to gather information and to establish individual contracts for change with the family members, he is also offering information to them. The therapist gives his understanding of the messages presented by the family; for example, as he asks questions such as:

What specific changes do you hope for for yourself?

he subtly presents his interpretation of what the family's presence for therapy means to him — namely, that their task is to make changes. This give-and-take process is an example of communication as well as being a communication in itself.

In each of Dave's responses, the therapist can identify a language form which fails to specify for the therapist some particular part of Dave's experience — the form: some things. This is an example of a common pattern — people coming to us for assistance often are not specific about what it is that they want or hope for. Our task, then, is to assist them in being specific. This is reflected in the words they use to communicate with others. When a part of a sentence picks out some specific portion of the listener's experience, then we say that that part has a referential index.[4] When a sentence part fails to pick out a specific part of the listener's experience, we say that it fails to have a referential index. Each time that Dave has responded, his sentence has included a part which failed to pick out a specific part of the therapist's experience (to have a referential index). This is a signal to the therapist to request that the speaker supply a referential index:

Can you tell me one thing. . .

Can you tell me what some of those things are...

Here the therapist is systematically assisting Dave to identify what he wants. At the same time, the therapist is providing the family members with an effective way of communicating. When the therapist hears something which he is unable to connect with his own experience, rather than let unsuccessful communication slide by or pretend that he really understands or that he can read Dave's mind, he simply identifies the portion of the sentence which he could not understand and asks about it. Any assumptions need to be checked out. The therapist, by demanding clear communication, gives the family the message that he takes seriously both his ability to understand and their ability to communicate, and that he is interested in really understanding what they want.

Therapist: Can you tell me what some of those things are?

Dave: Well, I don't know… I guess I've just lost touch …

Therapist: Lost touch with?

Dave: I don't know. . . . I'm not sure.

Therapist: Dave, what is it, specifically, that you don't know, that you're not sure of?