This first in a series of five papers on communication reticence discusses the ways and means of discovering people with communication problems. The isolation of "reticent" individuals, or those with an excessive amount of anxiety in communication situations, from the rest of the population is best accomplished by simply asking people if they would care to volunteer for instruction in common communication tasks (conversations, interviews, public speaking). A "rhetoritherapist," who deals only with the solution to communications problems, must be concerned with appropriate analysis of client deficiencies, establishment of goals, definition of deficiencies in subprocesses, client motivation and investment in treatment, and rhetorical quality. All instruction should be preceded by negotiation and an agreement of goals based on the individual's free choice; the assumption of pathology concerning "reticent" individuals is based on cultural definitions of appropriate communication and is not a necessary construct to treatment. (KS)