Circular questions compared to lineal ones elicit more abstract narratives and greater emotion recognition

Asking circular questions is a systemic psychotherapeutic technique (Selvini Palazzoli, 1980; Tomm, 1988) aimed to invite patients and family members to consider others’ point of view and hypotheses on relationships and problems complained. Unlike the linear questions aimed at expressing the preexisting beliefs about facts and people, circular questions should help people to reflect on others’ thoughts and feelings, to perceive their own thoughts and feelings as relative and susceptible of change, and to allow new views and interpretations on events and relational dynamics. As very few studies investigated the effect of this kind of questions we sought to study if they promote mentalization and reflective narratives.
We administered to 120 non-clinical participants the Basic Empathy Scale (BES) and the Reflective Functioning Questionnaire (RFQ-8) as baseline assessment. Afterward we asked four questions about participants' life episodes and personality; to a half of participants (Circular Questions Group) the questions were formulated in a circular form, to the other half (Lineal Questions Group) in the lineal form. At the end, both groups took the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test (RMET) and completed the Metacognitive Functioning Screening Scale (MFSS-30). Also, the answers of both groups were transcribed and analyzed through some computerized measures of linguistic style (Bucci, 2002).
At the baseline assessment the two groups did not differ in BES and RFQ scores, while after answering questions the Circular Questions Group showed significant higher scores in RMET (t = -7.903, p < .001) and in the Emotion Recognition subscale of MFSS-30 (t = -2.344, p < .05). Moreover, the narratives told by the Circular Questions Group were more abstract (t = -3.463, p < .001).
Circular questions seem to be a potential asset for the therapeutic process as they highly foster the others’ emotion recognition and increase the abstract reflection in people narratives.