Interviews - Data collection - The strategic value of sport to the Cape Town city brand

3.4 Data collection

3.4.1 Interviews

When generating data in qualitative research, King and Horrocks (2010:6) stated that interviewing is one of the most frequently used methods. Interviews are a type of survey or questionnaire where questions are conveyed during a personal meeting held with the interviewer with the purpose of obtaining information relevant to a particular research topic (Lynch, 2010:73). This qualitative method of research gives a rich and meaningful outline of stakeholder perceptions of the strategic value of sport to the Cape Town city brand.

Interviews have distinct advantages over other methods of research (Lynch, 2010:74).

Gratton and Jones (2004:142) highlighted a few:

 Interviews allow the participants to elaborate on personal experiences and interesting anecdotes of importance;

 Interviews provide more insight over other methods;

 Personal face-to-face interviews allow the researcher to observe „body language‟,

„facial expressions‟, and „tone of voice‟ of participants;

 Semi structured interviews allow for probing into observed areas, trust and rapport are established by personal face-to-face interviews, especially in confidential and sensitive cases;

 Interviews guarantee the researcher will obtain information from target participants as opposed to a random distribution of surveys or questionnaires; and lastly,

 Interviews allow the researcher a sense of control over responses by the manner in which the questions are posed as opposed to a series of „static‟ responses which may be the result of a survey or questionnaire.

However, disadvantages of interviews as highlighted by Gratton and Jones (2004:143) include: more time and travelling than required with surveys or questionnaires and as a consequence the results may be small and not represent the wider population. The researcher may be biased in choosing the participants, especially in the event of budget constraints. The researcher may become dominant and lead the interview in an unwanted direction. The analysis of the findings may be difficult, especially as there may be ambiguity in the responses of participants. The quality of the findings is dependent on the responses of participants. Finally, interviews are subject to problems of „recall‟, „misperception‟ and

„incorrect knowledge‟.

The interview schedule for this particular study was arranged in a semi-structured framework where the researcher presented a group of themed questions. However, the schedule allowed for probing, where necessary, thus further exploring the thoughts of the respondents.

The interview therefore allowed for flexibility in asking the order of the questions. The following section gives a detailed outline of the semi-structured approach.

3.4.1.1 Semi-structured interviews

Semi-structured interviews are where the researcher asks more or less open questions in the form of an interview guide (Flick, 2002:91). According to Edwards and Skinner (2009:107) these types of interviews are “often based on the knowledge of, and/or the assumption that

Table 3.4 Strengths, weaknesses and applications of interview approaches (Curran et al., 2014:113)

Strengths Weaknesses Applicability

Unstructured

 Provides rich information

 Explores previously unknown themes that arise from the interview

 Creates relationships which may lead to more information

 Uses natural language

 Very time consuming

 Resource intensive

 Lacking in generalisability

 Can generate lots of often irrelevant data

 Susceptible to interview bias

 Exploratory research investigating past events when subjective views and experiences are sought in

conjunction with other research methods.

Semi-structured

 Questions prepared in advance to cover critical points, useful when the researcher is inexperienced

 Interviewees still retain freedom and flexibility to express their own views

 Increased reliability and scope for comparability

 Interviewee is able to respond in language natural to them

 Time consuming

 Resource intensive

 Needs good interview skills to keep on topic

 Interview questions are open to researcher bias

 May lack in generalisability

 Multiple interviewers

 Only one chance to conduct the interview

 Researcher has some knowledge about the topic, in conjunction with other research methods

Structured

 Can produce consistent generalisable data

 Minimal risk of bias

 Can be conducted quickly

 Sophisticated interviewing skills not required

 Little opportunity for feedback

 Question responses are limited and restrictive

 Little scope to cater for the unforeseen

 Real-time changes to the interviews cannot be made

 Clear focus and question to be answered

 High level of knowledge on a topic to allow for appropriate question formulation

 Well developed literature

the respondents have had a particular experience they can elaborate upon”. Olsen (2012:35, 39) stated that the semi-structured interview leads to a transcript which involves writing/

typing the text of an interview or other sound file. The transcript allows for insight into mechanisms, processes, reasons for actions, and social structures as well as many other phenomena and may vary from six to 40 pages in length.

The following table from Curran, Lochrie and Gorman (2014:113) outlined the strengths, weaknesses and applications of various interview approaches. Based on the application process of the semi-structured interviews, the interviewing approach for this particular research study was selected.

46 3.5 Sample selection

A sample is a subset of the population of interest from which data is gathered that will give an estimate for some characteristic of the population (Shank, 2009:98). Not all sampling has a purpose, especially in the more interpretive research designs. Sampling may be to investigate a single group that is of particular interest to the researcher. In that case the results cannot be generalised to the overall population but the researcher should aim to generalise to theory so that the findings could be used to develop, refine or simply confirm an existing theory, which could then be applied to different samples (Gratton & Jones, 2004:100).

Although “early qualitative research focused on selecting a setting that afforded potential for exploring the issue central to research interests and relied on convenience sampling”, this particular study used a more strategic sampling approach using theoretical sampling. This type of sampling selection is described as a “technique that relies on selecting interviewees by virtue of characteristics thought by the researcher to be likely to have some bearing on their perceptions and experiences” (Babour, 2008:52). Gratton and Jones (2004:103) further described theoretical sampling as: “To sample organisations that had experienced such expertise concerning the study”. This method of sampling was also led to be more productive compared to what (Schwarz & Hunter, 2008:62) described as, a simple random sampling where the researcher uses some chance method that guarantees each member of the population has an equal chance to be selected for the sample.

Dalam dokumen The strategic value of sport to the Cape Town city brand (Halaman 52-55)