INTRODUCTION
The interview can be contrasted with the structured nature of the questionnaire survey (Chapter 8) in both the type of data that is collected, and how it is collected. Whereas the questionnaire collects highly structured data, and is often completed without the presence of the researcher, the researcher is a key element of the interview process, and his or her skills, attributes and interviewing technique are all an integral part of the success of this method in obtaining ‘rich’, qualitative data. The interview is undoubtedly the most common method by which qualitative data is collected in sport research. Culver et al. (2003), for example, have noted that in their review of sport psychology research, the interview was by far the most common method to collect qualitative data in that particular discipline.
■ Discuss when interviews are an appropriate data collection tool.
■ Introduce the different types of interview that you can undertake.
■ Discuss some of the issues of interview design and administration.
■ Introduce the concept of the focus group, or group interview.
In this chapter we will:
WHEN IS INTERVIEWING APPROPRIATE?
Interviewing is often associated with the collection of qualitative data, that is, the ‘why’ and ‘how’ of a phenomenon, from the respondent’s perspective. Interviews can collect data concerned with concepts that are difficult or inappropriate to measure, tend to allow respondents much more freedom in terms of their answers, and tend to explore questions of
‘why’ and ‘how’ rather than the ‘how many’ and ‘when’. Interviews tend to provide much richer data than, for example, a questionnaire survey, where respondents are generally limited to short and relatively simple responses by the format of the questionnaire, or lack the motivation to provide long, written answers. Whereas questionnaires are appropriate for collecting limited data from a large sample group, interviews are better at gaining richer data from smaller sample groups. Veal (2006) notes three situations where interviews tend to be used:
1 Where there is only a low population, making the quantitative approach of the questionnaire inappropriate.
2 Where the information is expected to vary considerably amongst respondents, and such information is likely to be complex and thus difficult to measure using other methods.
3 Where the research is exploratory, and interviews may be used to identify information that could be used to refine and develop further investigation.
As always, the key questions are those of ‘what information is needed?’
and ‘will this method provide such information?’ If rich, qualitative data is required, or you are looking for explanation, rather than description, then interviews are likely to be an appropriate method. If relatively simple data is required, then it is likely that questionnaire surveys will be a much more efficient method.
THE DIFFERENT TYPES OF INTERVIEW
Interviews can generally be classified under five categories: the structured interview, the semi-structured interview, the unstructured interview, the narrative interview and the focus group, or group interview.
■ The structured interview. This is essentially a questionnaire where the questions are read out by the researcher, who also notes the
responses. This has the advantage over a respondent completion questionnaire that the respondent can seek clarification over questions that may be unclear or ambiguous.
■ The semi-structured interview. This approach uses a standard set of questions, or schedule. However, the researcher adopts a flexible approach to data collection, and can alter the sequence of questions or probe for more information with subsidiary questions.
■ The unstructured interview. Here the researcher has a general idea of the topics to be covered, and the respondent tends to lead the direction of the interview. Further questions are developed by the researcher as the interview progresses. This allows the respondent to provide information from his or her own perspective, and to develop areas that are important to them, rather than being led by the interview schedule. There is the danger with this type of interview that much of the data will lack focus.
■ The narrative interview. This is an approach whereby the interviewee allows the participant time to describe and develop a story, and relive their experiences, and life histories, and how they see or make sense of things that have happened to them with very little involvement from the interviewee. The story emerges almost entirely from the participant.
■ The focus group. Essentially this is an interview involving a group, rather than one-on-one interaction, and interaction between members of the group is an important element in obtaining data. Focus groups tend towards being semi-structured in nature.
ADVANTAGES OF THE INTERVIEW METHOD
There are a number of methods that can be utilised within qualitative research, however the interview method has a number of advantages that make it appropriate in certain situations:
■ Interviews enable participants to talk about their own experiences in their own words, and allow them to elaborate on any areas of particular interest or importance.
■ The interview can be more insightful than other methods. As Yin (1994, p.80) notes, the interview ‘provides perceived causal infer- ences’ from the actor’s, rather than the researcher’s point of view. This allows the respondent to become more of an ‘informant’, providing
data from their own perspective, which is often desirable, especially within inductive research.
■ Interviews allow unexpected data to emerge. Unstructured, or semistructured interviews allow the emergence of important themes that may not emerge from a more structured format. This enables the subjects to reveal insights into their attitudes and behaviour that may not readily be apparent to the researcher from their prior awareness of the phenomenon. Questionnaires are restricted to a series of questions developed by the researcher, and respondents are limited to these questions, with the occasional final question along the lines of
‘if you have any further comments, please write these below’, which can be less than ideal in persuading participants to introduce new areas of information.
■ A face-to-face interview allows you to assess the participant’s body language, facial expressions, tone of voice, etc. which may be useful in some cases.
■ By using interviews, the researcher can introduce him or herself to the subject and establish trust and rapport, especially if any informa- tion is considered confidential, or sensitive.
■ Interviews allow you to investigate target groups that may be less able to complete surveys (such as the less well educated, or older or younger respondents for example).
■ Interviews may allow the researcher to develop a sense of time and history, rather than providing a series of ‘static’ responses, which may be the outcome of a survey. They allow the responses to be put into context, rather than providing a ‘snapshot’ picture.
DISADVANTAGES OF THE INTERVIEW METHOD
As well as the undoubted strengths of interviewing as a data collection method, it does have a number of potential weaknesses that need to be considered before you carry out any interviews:
■ Interviews require more resources than questionnaires. They may be expensive both in terms of time and travelling, and as a consequence the resulting sample may be small and unrepresentative of the wider population, especially if your budget is limited.
■ It is possible that you may add bias as a result of your – often unconscious – verbal and non-verbal reactions, for example through
nodding at certain responses, which may encourage the informant to answer in the manner that he or she thinks you want. It may be the case that the participant thinks that they have to provide the ‘right’ answers, rather than their own views, which may be exacerbated by you nodding or shaking your head after each response.
■ One potential danger is that of the interviewee becoming dominant and leading the interview in unwanted directions. The researcher must be prepared to guide the interviewee back to the interview schedule.
■ Analysis of the data may be difficult. The analysis of questionnaire data is often relatively straightforward, and requires little or no interpretation on the part of the researcher. Reliable and valid analysis of qualitative interview data may be more difficult, especially where there may be ambiguity. As Fontana and Frey (1998, p.47) suggest:
‘Asking questions and getting answers is a much harder task than it may seem at first. The spoken word always has a residue of ambiguity, no matter how carefully we word the questions and report or code the answers.’
■ As with all self-report measures, the quality of the data is dependent upon the responses of the interviewee. Interviewees are subject to problems of recall, misperception and incorrect knowledge.
Thus, as with all methods, the strengths of the interview need to be consolidated, and the weaknesses eradicated as far as possible. The use of appropriate probes, neutral body language and validation of your interpretation of the data by others (more on these points later) can be used to minimise such bias.
DESIGNING THE INTERVIEW SCHEDULE
Designing the interview largely follows the same process as designing a questionnaire, that is you need to identify what information is required, and how you will get that information using an interview. The two key differences are that first, your interview schedule is likely to be much less prescriptive that a questionnaire, and may simply include a list of bullet points regarding topics that you are looking to cover (or even less, if undertaking a narrative interview), and second, once you have determined the structure of your questionnaire, you are generally unable to alter it, whereas you may be able to continually develop and refine your interview
schedule to some extent between interviews. A few points to note when constructing your initial interview schedule are as follows:
■ Introduce the purpose and structure of the interview beforehand. In much the same way that a covering letter for a questionnaire provides the respondent with important information, your introduction should also ‘set the scene’, and you may find it useful to apply the guidelines given on covering letters in Chapter 8 to your introduction.
■ Group questions about the same concept together, and try to avoid jumping back and forwards between topics.
■ Begin with one or more ‘easy’ questions that will put the respondent at ease, and encourage them to begin talking comfortably. This question need not be directly relevant to the research – it is more important at this stage to gain the co-operation and trust of the interviewee.
■ Ensure that the questions are clearly worded, unambiguous and understandable to the interviewee. Make sure too that the relevance of each question is clear to the interviewee. If the relevance is not apparent, or if the interviewee seems unclear, then take time to explain the purpose of the question.
■ Ask personal, or potentially threatening questions (if necessary to the research) towards the end of the interview, once you have had a chance to develop trust between interviewer and interviewee.
Once a preliminary interview schedule has been developed, then it is important to pilot it, in much the same way as you would do with a questionnaire. As well as testing the questions, piloting an interview provides a further important function. It will provide a useful run through for the interviewer, and may increase confidence when it comes to the actual interviews, especially for the inexperienced researcher.
CARRYING OUT THE INTERVIEW
It is important for you to project professionalism, enthusiasm and con- fidence to the interviewee. Both appearance and demeanour are important in projecting these. As well as being appropriately dressed, you should ensure that you appear knowledgeable about the subject under discussion, and can discuss this confidently. Thus, it is not a good idea to rush into interviews before you have become proficient in your field of study. The
location of the interview is important. It needs to take place where the interviewee is comfortable answering questions, such as their own home or office. The location should be relatively private so that there will be no bias from the presence of others (ensure that the interview cannot be overheard, as this can be extremely off-putting to the participant). Finally, the interview should take place in a location free from high levels of background noise, especially if the interview is being recorded.
The skills required by an interviewer are more than those of simply being able to talk to others. Always remember that the overall objective of the interview is to gather rich, detailed data to answer your research question.
To achieve this, Hannabus (1996) suggests the following techniques:
■ Establish rapport – this should start from when you first contact your interviewee.
■ Keep the discussion going. Short periods of silence may actually be beneficial, in that the interviewee may be persuaded to provide further data, but try to avoid periods of lengthy silence. Know when not to interrupt and let silences work for you, but be prepared to step in with a comment or further questions if appropriate.
■ Avoid asking questions which can be answered with simply a ‘yes’ or a ‘no’.
■ Avoid jargon and abstractions with which the interviewee is unlikely to be familiar.
■ Avoid double negatives and loaded expressions.
■ Be non-judgemental in your reactions to the interviewee’s responses, and avoid reacting in any way that may influence further data collec- tion.
■ Remember to keep focusing on your research objectives, and try not to stray from them.
In addition, Fontana and Frey (1998) provide some useful guidelines that may seem obvious, but are often overlooked by researchers. These include:
■ Never deviate from the introduction, sequence of questions (if it is a structured interview) or question wording unless you feel that you will be able to obtain better data from the interviewee.
■ Never let another person interrupt, or offer their own views on the question.
■ Never suggest an answer, or show agreement or disagreement with a response. Your own views should not be apparent to the interviewee.
Interview skills do need to be practised. Although they may be relatively easy to achieve in an informal or social setting, the artificial nature of an interview makes them harder to attain, and it is likely that you will feel after your first few interviews that perhaps things didn’t go quite as well as they could. Don’t worry – your technique will improve as you persevere.
If you have videoed your initial interviews, then it can often be a good idea to observe your own interviewing technique. Otherwise, you may be able to gain feedback from interviewees, and develop your technique accordingly.
PROBING
One key advantage of the interview as a research method is that of your opportunity to probe. A probe is where the researcher can gain additional information from the respondent through using particular techniques. Two types of probe can be used:
■ Clarification probes. These allow you to clarify any point that was not clear, or open to misunderstanding by the interviewee, or to clarify your understanding of a point made by the inter- viewee.
■ Elaboration probes. These are used to elicit a more in-depth response about a particular point related to the interview. For example using phrases such as ‘why is that?’, ‘could you expand on that?’ or ‘could you tell me more about that?’ will often enhance the richness and quality of your data. You may be interested in the reasons why people purchase sports equipment.
Their initial response may be something along the lines of ‘I like the appearance’. You would then ask something along the lines of ‘what is it about the appearance you like?’, and then follow up with a further probe, such as ‘why is that important?’. This method allows you to collect a lot of rich detail from relatively few questions.
MOTIVATING THE INFORMANT
The overall objective of the interview is to ensure that the respondent feels willing to provide the desired information, otherwise it is likely that the data will lack validity, especially if the interviewee feels pressurised into taking part, or just wants to get the interview finished as quickly as possible. Frankfort-Nachimas and Nachimas (1996) identify three factors that will help motivate the interviewee to co-operate with the researcher:
1 The respondent must feel that the interview will be enjoyable and satisfying. Three factors are important here. First the personal demeanour of the researcher must be such as to create a good impres- sion. Second, the informant must be briefed as to the nature of the interview and how it is to be carried out, and given an indication of the likely length. Third, the location and timing of the interview are important, and it is advisable to let the respondent choose these as far as is practical.
2 The respondent needs to see the study as worthwhile. The respondent should feel that they are making a contribution to a worthwhile study.
This can be done when individuals are initially approached to take part in the interview, as well as in the briefing beforehand.
3 Perceived barriers in the respondent’s mind need to be overcome.
Trust needs to be developed. This can be done by explaining who you are and why you are doing the study, as well as how the respondent came to be chosen, and by ensuring the confidential nature of the research.
A further factor is also important here, this being the credibility of the interviewer. You also need to project your competence and credibility to be undertaking such research, and demonstrate an awareness of the key issues related to your interview. You will need to demonstrate a level of knowledge about the subject area yourself.
ASKING SENSITIVE QUESTIONS
You may, at some stage in the interview, need to ask questions that the interviewee may perceive as sensitive, or even potentially threatening in some way. It is often tempting simply to play safe and not ask these questions; however, it may be that such sensitive information is important
to your research. If you do have to ask sensitive questions, you should ensure that you follow a number of guidelines:
■ Ensure that the respondent is aware of the confidentiality of that data.
■ Be careful in your use of language when you first approach the interviewee for help. Avoid phrases such as ‘I want to investigate . . .’, which may imply that you are looking to uncover something underhand, and use neutral language, such as ‘I am hoping to explore . . .’ instead.
■ Don’t ask sensitive questions at the beginning of the interview. Wait until you have established trust and rapport with the interviewee.
■ Try not to ask such questions in any way that could be construed as
‘loaded’. This is one area where piloting of the interview can be extremely useful.
■ Ensure that it is clear to the respondent, if at all possible, why you are asking the question. If the respondent can see the face validity of the question, then they are more likely to give you a response.
■ If you are seriously worried about asking a particular question or series of questions, then acknowledge this to the interviewee.
■ Do not coerce the respondent into giving an answer. They are entitled not to answer any questions, and cannot be forced to do so.
RECORDING THE INTERVIEW
Interviews must be recorded in some form – it is simply not possible to rely on recall alone. The choice is generally between that of written notes or tape or video recording. Sometimes the respondent will determine the choice of method, in that certain individuals may be uncomfortable being taped (you must ask for their consent before recording). Taking written notes has two main advantages: first, it precludes potential problems created by using recording equipment, such as ensuring responses are audible, battery failure and so on. Second, if the researcher records only data that is relevant to the research question, then time may be saved in identifying and discarding irrelevant data. Writing notes can, however, result in a loss of rapport between interviewer and interviewee, and the interviewer’s focus may be divided between the respondent and writing down notes. Recording the interview will allow more rapport to develop, which may result in more information being divulged from the respon- dent. This will, however, result in much more data to be analysed, and a