In Garfinkle’s experiment, the student’s sense of the counsellor’s answers was derived from the context of the interaction. From the setting-a psychiatry department-and the information they were given, the students believed that the cousellor was what he claimed to be and that he was doing his best to give honest and sound advice.
His answers were interpreted within the framework of this context. If identical answers were received to the same set of questions from a fellow student in a coffee bar, the change of context would probably result in a very different interpretation.
Such responses from a fellow student may be seen as evidence that he had temporarily taken leave of his senses or was having a joke at” friend’s expense or was under the influence of alcohol and so on. Garfinkel argues that the sense any action is achieved by reference to its context.
Members’ sense of what is happening or going depends on the way they interpret the context of the activity concerned. In this respect their understand and accounts are indexical: they make sense in terms of particular settings.