ABSTRACT
Two themes guide our analysis of the face-to-face consultation: strategies and negotiation. Essentially both actors (although we concentrate on the patient) are concerned with the same problem. This problem is effective selfpresentation. As in all interaction, the conscious and unconscious presentation of the self affects the behaviour of the other and calls forth a reaction by the other. But in the consultation there is the problem of the outcome that is desired by both actors. People do not hand over all control and decisionmaking to the doctor merely by becoming patients. The presentation of the self can be used as a strategy. The aim of the strategies used by both patient and doctor is to attempt to control and direct the consultation along their own desired lines, to persuade the other to recognise or accept a particular perspective on, and orientation to, the problem that has been brought.
