Getting and giving information: analysis of a family-interview strategy

This paper reports on a videotape study of particular aspects of the two-part interview developed by Selvini-Palazzoli et al. (8, 9). The first segment is a "search for information," the second part the application of an intervention based on the information gathered in the first part. The study focused on the strategies of information retrieval on the premise that they are significant for the quality of information gathered and for the criteria implicitly conveyed by the therapist that in turn have their own substantial impact on the system. We have employed theories of communication, particularly conversational analysis, that are a departure from the epistemological premises of systems theory and communication pragmatics proposed by Selvini-Palazzoli et al. as the theoretical underpinning of their interview technique.