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the length of time intervening between the asking of the question by the auditor and
the reply to that specific question by the preclear. The question must be precise; the reply must be precisely to that question. It does not matter what intervenes in the time between the asking of the question and the receipt of the answer. The preclear may outflow, jabber, discuss, pause, hedge, disperse, dither or be silent; no matter what he does or how he does it, between the asking of the question and the giving of the answer, the time is the communication lag. The near answer, a guessing answer, an undecided answer, are alike imprecise answers, and are not adequate responses to the question. On receipt of such questionable answers, the auditor must ask the question again. That he asks the question again does not reduce the communication lag; he is still operating from the moment he asked the question the first time. And if he has to ask the question 20 or 30 times more in the next hour in order to get a precise and adequate answer from the preclear, the length of time of the lag would be from the asking of the first question to the final receipt of the answer. Near answers to the question are inadequate, and are, themselves, simply part of the communication lag. (PAB 43)