4.3.1 Being a Good Observer
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The usual, day-to-day alternative to the repertory grid! Of course, you can
identify the way in which people construe events and circumstances from
their general behaviour, as you interact with them. You look at what they do,
and the way they do it. From this, you try to see how they understand the
situation you’re both in; the distinctions and similarities they recognise as events
unfold. What do they consider to be ‘the same’, and therefore unremarkable?
What, for them, stands out and grabs their attention?
The more you care about your interaction with other people, the more likely it
is that you will try to see things from their point of view in order to interact
more effectively with them.
Kelly felt that thiswas soimportant that hebuilt it intohistheoryasa formalstatement.
Foralist of these see Appendix 6.His Sociality Corollary states:‘To the extent that one
person construes the construction process of another, he may play a role in a social
process involving the other person.’ Role relationships, he’s saying (such as the
relationship between a learner and a teacher; an employee and the owner of the
firm; a person and his or her partner), depend for their success on the extent to
which each person can see events of mutual importance through the other person’s
eyes.
This may seem obvious ^ until you realise what Kelly is not saying. Successful role
relationships do not necessarily depend on people seeing the world (construing the
meaning of events) in the same way.We don’t have to have the same constructs as
other people to relate to them effectively. All that’s required is that we learn a little
about their constructs, especially those which result in them seeing the same events
differently to ourselves.
There’s one exception. In those close situationsinwhich the other person’s constructs
matter to us because they help to confirm how we think about ourselves (as in
friendship formation, therapy, and marriage), having some shared constructs helps
(Duck,1973; Neimeyer & Neimeyer,1985; Leitner & Pfenninger,1994).
That apart, we can relate effectively even though our constructs differ (so long as we
know this), and to the extent that weknow what the other person’s constructs are.
There are several ways in which you can use a grid to check your own
attempts at sociality through observation, and the main procedure is described
in Section 9.2.3.
People vary in how well they can put themselves in other people’s shoes.
Sometimes, the very pressure of events prevents you from getting a good ‘fix’
on the other person. A good way of creating the space in which to understand
the other person’s constructs, without going to the formal extent of a repertory
grid, is by asking them to tell you a story about themselves (Mair, 1989, 1990).