Exam 5: How to Amplify What Clients Want: the Miracle Question

A client first used the word "miracle" in a goal-formulation conversation with Insoo Kim Berg and gave the practitioners at BFTC the idea of asking the miracle question.

Ah Yan often first responded to Peter's goal-formulation questions by saying, "I don't know."

Well-formed goals involve the client specifying the absence of something undesirable rather than the presence of something desirable.

Solution building cannot be used with clients who are isolated or live alone because the worker cannot meaningfully ask relationship questions which focus on the client's interactional context.

It is best for the interviewer to ask clients to describe their goals as an end state or final result of their efforts, rather than as a beginning ste

In the Williams family case, Albert

Relationship questions are used to help clients expand their goal definitions.

The miracle question is best asked slowly, dramatically, and with many follow-up questions which include the phrase: "What will be different ....?"

First and foremost, well-formed goals are:

The miracle question is useful for all of the following reasons except:

Well-formed goals are those which first of all are defined within the client's frame of reference--not the practitioner's.

Goals should be described by clients in concrete, measurable terms instead of in vague and general terms.

In meeting with several members of a family, the practitioner invites the family members to work toward a joint definition of goals and a joint solution.

For young children, the word miracle may be too abstract to be useful; it is better to substitute words such as magic wand, gold dust, and magic.

It is usually more useful to clients to work with them at defining what will be different when their problems are solved before working on how they might make that happen.

The "miracle question" is used mainly to:

Ah Yan indicated that leaving her husband was a part of her "miracle picture."

Which of the following better fits the characteristics of well-formed goals?