Paradoxical Communication: 6 Keys To Understand It

Why do people sometimes say yes when we are thinking a resounding no? Why do we prefer to keep quiet and say nothing, if we are really very clear about what we want? What mechanism underlies these situations? Paradoxical communication is responsible.

Day by day we find ourselves immersed in a large number of relationships. Therefore, the basis and, at the same time, the objective of human communication is to get to understand each other. Is it so difficult to get it?

Yes, but no and quite the opposite

The relationship we have with others is largely determined by the way we communicate.  So misunderstandings, assumptions, fallacies, or ambiguities don’t make good friends with communicative clarity.

Specifically, paradoxical communication is a contradiction resulting from a correct deduction from congruent premises. Although it may seem like a puzzle, with this example of a conversation between mother and daughter you will understand perfectly:

• “Honey, help me set the table”
• “Mom, I thought I better not stay for the family meal. I’d rather go to the movies with a friend, okay? “
• “Well, you see …”

Although surely the mother’s will is for her daughter to stay for lunch, her words leave the decision to her daughter. The mother thinks one thing, says the opposite, and her daughter must infer that she wants her to stay. In her the doubt will arise between yielding to the hidden intention of her mother or sticking to the content. Whatever you do will influence your mother, causing a change in the relationship. This is an example of paradoxical communication.

For the mother’s response to be consistent with what she wants, she should have stated:

• “No. You’d better stay here, eat with us and you’ll go to the movies another day with your friend ”.

Like this case, there are many more that are produced in our day to day and of which we are barely aware. It is evident that it is not only the content of the message that you want to convey that matters, but the intention behind it.

Paradox is characterized by ambiguity

“Calm me with your explanations” but “whatever you tell me, nothing is going to calm me down.” One thing and the opposite.

Paradoxical communication is based on the diversity of ways in which we can interpret the same message. We doubt the intentions of the other person and choose to interpret what he tells us in the way that suits us best or what we think he means.

The point is that this explanation that we construct does not have to coincide with the one that the other wants to convey to us. Or if. There is the uncertainty, confusion and misunderstanding.

The more specific we are in what we want to convey, the less space we will leave to ambiguity and the higher the quality of communication we will have with others.

The logic of Watzlawich’s misunderstanding

Paul Watzlawick was an Austrian theorist and psychologist who became a reference in the field of Psychotherapy. Their investigations tried to explain why sometimes it is so difficult to achieve a metacommunication and so easy the opposite: to disengage. To understand it, it is good to know his 5 axioms of human communication:

• It is impossible not to communicate: communication always occurs, because at the very least, the message that you do not want to communicate is transmitted. Silence is also communication.
• All communication has a content level (what) and a relationship level (how).
• The nature of a relationship depends on the gradation that the participants make of the communicational sequences between them: the communicative process is a feedback system, generated by a sender and a receiver.

• Human communication involves two modalities:  digital level and analog level. We’ll delve into both below.
• Communicational exchanges can be both symmetrical and complementary: depending on whether or not there is equality in the relationship.

Human communication involves two modalities

For Watzlawick, there are two types of language to express the same content : the analog and digital level.

• Digital level: what is said. It refers to the content of the message itself, understandable, direct and that does not need to be translated. When you say “I need more affection”, “I am very happy”, “I want you to value me”. There is no room for interpretations. The signified and the signifier coincide.

• Analog level: what is really meant. What is the intention or the background behind those words. It implies a higher level of inference.

In the previous example, the mother would be transmitting to her daughter in these two types of language:

• Digital level: “you decide if you stay for lunch or go to the movies”
• Analog level: “you stay here, because you are going to do what your mother tells you”.

The double bind theory

In the same way that these two levels can coincide, they can also contradict each other. Language and words do not have a double meaning by themselves, but we are the ones who attribute it to them. 

Authors such as Bateson, Jackson, Haley and Weakland continued to delve into this phenomenon and spoke of the existence of a double bind: the paradox turned into contradiction. They studied this type of paradoxical communication in patients diagnosed with schizophrenia.

With the results of their research, they tried to explain how the family context and communication influence the appearance and maintenance of this type of pathology. They defined the double bind as an unhealthy relationship that has the following properties and characteristics:

• It occurs when a situation of great intensity or emotional charge takes place.
• There is a paradoxical communication: two contradictory messages are emitted at the same time. Most of the time, one verbally and the other non-verbally. It is the result of a degree of incongruity between the two previous levels (analog and digital).
• There is a power relationship between the one who emits the message and the one who receives it.  The person emits the message prevents the other from deciphering and talking about the contradiction. It also leaves you no room to act. Whatever you do, you are caught in a trap.

Bateson illustrated the double bind with a very revealing example.  He used the case of a family in which the older brother is constantly making fun of the younger, who is also a very shy child.

The mockery reaches such a point that the little one screams in frustration and helplessness when feeling despised. The consequences are that the brother stops bothering him, but the parents punish the child for yelling.

In this situation the child is receiving two totally contradictory messages. On the one hand, you must express your feelings in order to be accepted (not to be made fun of). On the other hand, you should not do it to be equally accepted (if you show them, the consequences hurt you). Which of them do you keep?

The authors concluded that double bind is a dysfunctional and unbalanced form of communication that disorients and confuses people. The subject does not know what to expect and this leads to a series of possible disorders and difficulties in the relationship with others and in himself.

As we can see, we find ourselves surrounded by paradoxical communication and double bonds. For example, when we find a sign that says “don’t read this”, someone warning you “be more spontaneous” or “don’t be so obedient”. All of them look for contradictory answers in relation to what they advertise.

We recommend this video excerpt from the Ken Loach movie Family Life (1971). In it, you can see a wonderful example of paradoxical and double-bind communication in the family context.

Paradoxical communication as a reason for conflict in a couple

When problems arise in a love relationship, the problem is usually found in the lack of mutual communication. As in the family context, we  also transmit mixed messages about how we feel or what we want from our partner. 

• Woman: “ I had a tiring day at work today. On top of that the children have been playing in the living room and look how they have left everything! ”.
• Husband (thinks): “ And what does he want? If I just got home and I am also very tired. You’re not asking me to clean the room myself, right? “
• Husband (says): ” Well, you clean it, huh?”

The way the husband responds to his wife is revealing. He not only assumes that his wife is indirectly asking him to clean up the salon; Rather, your answer is totally out of context and bordering on rudeness.

The best thing would be for him to ask her: “ Do you want me to order it? do I help you? What do you need? “. But he decides, as a result of his beliefs and ingrained assumptions, that it is her intention not to collect.

This reflects that both  are not conveying their intentions clearly enough. In addition, paradoxical communication is not usually something specific, but has a snowball effect. It tends to drag from conversation to conversation and can become chronic in the relationship.

In the joint interviews carried out by the therapist, it can be observed how a couple shakes with the gestures and emits aggressive criticism, at the same time that they disguise their hostility with a language that seems affectionate or vice versa.

Identifying the paradox helps, sometimes, to read the other, to know what they think even if they remain silent. However, on other occasions when there is not such a willingness to understand, it can generate very damaging consequences for the relationship and significant conflicts. We insist that in order to communicate properly, the first thing we have to do is understand ourselves.

Bibliography

• Watzlawick, P., Bavelas, B. and Jackson, D. (2008). Human communication Theory. New York: Herder.

• Cejalvo, J. (2009). Personality from the systemic perspective. In JA Ríos, Personality, human maturity and family context. Madrid: CCS.
• Mucchielli, A. Communication Psychology; Paidós Communication, pp. 115-117.