Hypothetical Questions: A Comparative Analysis and Implications for “Applied” vs. “Basic” Conversation Analysis

Abstract

Hypothetical questions (HQs) are a special class of conditional question that seek a response by proposing a “what-if” situation. It is not clear to what extent view testing HQs represent a generic conversational device that operates in a similar way across contexts. I conduct a comparative analysis of HQs across four different interactional settings: ordinary conversations, research interactions, broadcast news interviews, and doctor–patient consultations. I show that while the practice of using HQs to test recipients' views and commitments is generic, or context free, both the form and function of HQs and the precise way they run off in each case are attentive in their detail to the interactional demands and affordances of the setting. I suggest that in the future, both “applied” and “basic” conversation analysis (CA) might benefit from conducting comparative analyses.

Acknowledgments

I gratefully acknowledge the support of the UK's Economic and Social Research Council, Award Number RES-148-25-0029, which funded the collection of the corpus from which Extracts 7 and 9 are drawn. I am indebted to John Heritage and Liz Stokoe for their input during the early development of the article, and the editor and reviewers for their comments. I take full responsibility for the views presented here, and any errors are my own.

Notes

¹Maynard shows that when they have bad news to deliver to parents about their children, physicians typically begin by eliciting the parent's view on what is wrong. Once the parent has delivered their view, the physician has the opportunity to confirm or correct it, before delivering his or her diagnosis.