4.2 Interviews
4.2.1 The Essential Features of Interviews
Interviews are an approach to collect data from participants (Denscombe, 2014). Interviews have two types: standardised (structured) and non-standardised (semi-structured and unstructured). Standardised interviews refer to that according to the requirements of a certain position, interviewees should follow fixed principles to response the closed questions in questionnaires. Also, standardised interviewing means an interview that structured elements, such as contents, forms, procedures, standard for evaluation as well as the synthesis and analysis of results, follow the unified standards and requirements to conduct. It therefore is known as quantitative research interviews (Saunders
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4.2.2 The Procedures of Unstructured Interviews
As for the procedures of unstructured interviews, Moyle (2002) conducted qualitative interviews to discuss the challenges when interviewees have a major depressive illness. It explored the meaning of that seven participants were hospitalized for depression. First, the researcher clarified the research aim and issues. The aim is to explore some challenges when participants who have a major depressive illness conducted unstructured interviews. One of the open-ended questions is ‘Tell me about your experience of childbirth’ (Moyle, 2002, p.267). Second, the researcher identified sample data. ‘Seven participants, six females and one male, aged from 38 to 56 years, were interviewed about their experience of being nurtured while depressed during their stay in a Brisbane, Australia, private psychiatric hospital’ (Moyle, 2002, p.268). Third, the researcher conducted the semi-structured and unstructured interviews. Open-ended questions allow interviewees to develop their own statements. ‘Participants were interviewed weekly while hospitalized’, one time of interviews ranged from 20 to 60 minutes in length. Participants were recorded by audiotape and some response of interviewees were transcribed verbatim. Fourth, the researcher analyzed the results. The researchers firstly used open methods to transcribe response from interviews. Then the conceptual
Research on interviews has generally shown that standardized procedures are higher in their reliability and validity than unstructured interviews. Learning how structured
This can lead to: lack of concentration, interview lasting longer or be terminated, which can result in unreliable answers. To possibly avoid these I could: go in a quiet room, allow extra time and avoid sensitive questions. I will be doing interviews with teachers that teach visually impaired children rather than the child because the child may feel uncomfortable talking one-to-one with an unknown adult and yet I can still get the answers needed through the
The pilot study conducted in this research shows that there were a few problems within the overall design of the interview and therefore the researchers decided to make some minor changes to their design, these changes included altering the questions so they were open ended, they also made the interview less structured in able to gain more focused answers in which they could analyse.
The data collection that was chosen in qualitative research is interviews. Interviewing involves asking questions and getting answers from participants in a study. Interviewing has a variety of forms (Rowley, 2012). These forms are: individual, face-to-face interviews and face-to-face group interviewing. Asking and answers of question can be done by the telephone, face-to-face, and also many include other electronic devises. Interviews can either be structured, semi-structure, and unstructured (Rowley, 2012).
The procedure used to collect information for the research study is a survey and the techniques used were interview and questionnaire. An interview is when questions are posed to an individual to obtain information (What Is Survey Research? - Definition, Methods & Types, n.d.). A questionnaire is a series of written questions a participant answers (What Is Survey Research? - Definition, Methods & Types, n.d.). Follow- up questionnaires were administered to participant face- to- face and participants who were living long distance were interviewed by telephone.
Over 4 years of extensive experience, knowledge, skills and abilities with providing services to people with varying socio-economic backgrounds, low income, including individuals with disabilities obtain services needed.
For the interview section of the group project, I decided to interview a twenty-five year old woman who resides in the San Francisco bay area in California. Choosing to have her personal identity remain anonymous, the interviewee has granted us permission to refer to her as the alias Mary. Mary is currently married to a thirty year old man and has one nine year old son. Surprisingly, Mary did not contract the disease by having heterosexual intercourse with her partner like so many other women have gotten HIV. She had obtained the disease through intravenous means. Mary’s husband and son are not HIV positive. Mary has been
We are going to look at the use of interviewing techniques by those who investigate. As a result of interviews conducted after accidents and criminal offenses, the interviewer must be able to analyze witness statements in order to translate witness observations into facts and create logic from confusion. The interviewer must have an understanding of those factors that affect witness reporting. The gathering of witness information comprises about 50 percent of the investigating technique, the remaining 50 percent hinges on the ability of the interviewer to analyze and apply his or her knowledge to the sometimes
Geoff is a little bit different than the other two that I interviewed. While both of the previous people worked for international corporations that had executives and a board of directors, Geoff works for a pizza franchise. While it does have half a dozen stores throughout South Florida, it is simply not at the same scale as these previous companies. However, it is interesting to note that he complains of similar issues as the other two. Namely – lack of planning.
The interviews were recorded on tape this was good method of recording because sometimes when the information is written it can be translated different by the person who is recording the answers as they may interpret it differently. The other drawback that occurred in this study is that the exact design of the questions been asked to the respondents varied, this can affect the results as one person may elaborate more than someone else and therefore has the opportunity to be asked further questions. “The exact format of each individual was determined by the participant, as the individual questions presented to each person varied according to earlier individual responses.” (Appendix 1)
It is important that the interview questions are not biased or leading, and that the questions do not cause any psychological or emotional harm. The subject will not be intentionally deceived. The questions and data interpretation have an ethical consideration to be valid and truthful for the research institution and for the scholarly body as a whole. Another consideration is the safety of the interviewee because the study wants honest and sincere answers, but it also does not want to leave the interviewee in a vulnerable state or location. The concern of a power differential between the interviewee and interviewer is important because the interviewer will be from a university, and the interviewee will be unemployed and possibly even homeless. While the
Over the course of the semester, we have learned a variety of interviewing techniques and put them into practice. We have videotaped ourselves interviewing and spent time analyzing it; we have spent time in the classroom participating in role-play scenarios. These experiences have given me the chance to begin learning and developing my own set of interviewing techniques and skills. To culminate our learning for the semester, we conducted one final interview and in this paper I will reflect on it in the context of the entirety of the class.
A main advantage of using a structured interview instead of an unstructured interview is that because the interviewer can standardise and controlled they are seen as reliable. Because of this, other sociologists can repeat the research and get the same results because they can ensure that the interview is conducted in the same
Whereas a structured interview follows a standardised format, in an unstructured interview the interviewer has complete freedom to vary the interview. Supporters argue that this brings a number of important advantages. Such as, rapport and sensitivity, the interviewee's views are clearer, the ability to check understanding, flexibility and the ability for the interviewer to explore unfamiliar topics. However, there are multiple disadvantages to using unstructured interviews in sociological research. Such as, practical problems, which include, time and sample size, training, and interpersonal skills, there are also issues with representativeness, reliability, quantification and validity.
Conducting interviews is fundamental as a case manager. In order to understand more about good interviewing, I decided to watch an interview about an addict mother conducted by Dr. Phil. While watching this interview, I made some notes on attitudes and characteristics that I considered important for good interviewing. The characteristics will be presented in the following paragraphs.