The Encyclopedia of Interactive Performance

Some questions invite brief answers. (“What branch of the military did you serve in?”) Others require specialized knowledge. (“What strategies did you use in battle?”) If you want expansive responses that are easy to generate, ask topic questions. These can be answered from a spect’s general knowledge base. (“What was it like when you fought in the war?”)

You can also use topic questions to get spects to generate backstory. This is done by establishing the topic of the story and then asking them to tell you about it. (“I heard that your family had a surprise for you last week. What happened?”)

An effective way to support spects’ answers is to exhibit concurrent emotion while they’re responding. This encourages them to continue because they can see how their response is affecting you as they’re speaking.

A topic question sometimes elicits only a brief response from the spect. If you want a more comprehensive answer, follow up with a why question or an echo question.

When you want spects to give broad answers or generate backstory, use a topic question.