interviews

What is an interview?

Used to collect data through direct verbal interaction between a researcher and one or more participants - gain in depth insights into thoughts, experiences and perspectives

What is a structured interview?

Interviewer given strict instructions on how to ask the questions - interview conducted in a standardised way (same order of q’s)

What are informal interviews?

Guided convos, interviewer has complete freedom to change the q, wording, order and ask follow up q

What are the two other types of interviews?

Semi structured, group

Practical advantage of interviews

• Training straight forward and cheap

• Allow researchers to cover large numbers of participants effectively

Practical disadvantage of interviews

• More costly than posting/emailing questionnaires bc training is money

Ethical advantage of interviews

• Provide informed consent and have the right to withdraw

Ethical disadvantage of interviews

• May feel pressured to answer in a certain way when there’s an interviewer

Are interviews reliable?

Yes bc all respondents answer the questions in the sane way it’s easy to replicate

Are interviews valid?

• Presence of interviewer can clarify misunderstandings so there’s more accurate response

• But preset answers might not reflect the interviewees actual views

What is an example of interviews?

Young and Wilmott (1962) used structured interviews in their studies of extended families in east London

are interviews representative?

• Higher response rate compared to questionnaires = findings generalisable

• Certain types of ppl more likely to agree than others

Which theoretical perspective like interviews?

• Positivists = quantitative data that can be statistically organised