Presumptive and bait questions have a couple of things in common, aside from being extremely powerful. First, they both have a limited shelf life in the information collection process. If you overuse them, the person is likely going to figure out what you’re doing. It will trigger his defenses, and he’ll view you as an adversary who’s trying to trick or mislead him in some way. We’ve found that generally, presumptive and bait questions should each be used no more than two or three times in the course of an hour-long interaction.
