Communicating about Communication in a Therapeutic Interview

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Abstract
The aim of this article is to focus on the conversational and interactional processes by which the patient and the therapist make sense of a therapeutic situation and give meaning to the problem at the origin of the consultation. The article presents a method of analysis that relies on a specific conversational activity: reformulation. After a brief definition of this activity and a presentation of the method, a few sequences of reformulation concerning communication are analyzed at three different levels: the semantic level, the relational level, and the facework level, which refers to the management of the actors' identities. The conclusions focus on some specificities of the therapist's activity, namely the transformation of the patient's discourse into a defined problem; the therapist's change ofperspective vis-e-vis that of the patient; the therapist's implicit teaching role regarding the interactional rules of the situation, social values and norms, and scientific theories and jargon.

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