Microanalysis of Formulations in Solution-Focused Brief Therapy, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, and Motivational Interviewing

Formulation, in the research literature, refers to an everyday conversational practice in which one person comments on what another has said. Terms such as echoing, paraphrasing, or summarizing are used for formulating in therapy, where these are usually considered neutral techniques. We propose that therapists' formulations are not neutral because they selectively preserve, omit, alter, or even add to what a client has said. Using the method of microanalysis, we compared formulations made within different therapeutic approaches. The data were the opening minutes of demonstration videos by two Solution-Focused Brief Therapy experts, two Cognitive Behavioral Therapy experts, and one Motivational Interviewing expert. As predicted, the SFBT formulations preserved a significantly higher proportion of the client's exact words and added significantly fewer of the therapist's interpretations than did the CBT and MI formulations. Examples illustrate the role of formulations as an observable process through which co-construction takes place in dialogue.