How to do a research interview

[Music] this video shows an example of a poorly done interview and contrast it with a much better one to give the context for this I'm first going to summarize the 10

characteristics of a good interviewer that Steiner cavala gives in his 1996 book interviews Kavala starts with the interviewer needs

to be knowledgeable and familiar with the topic of the interviewer and will have piloted to give themselves practice and experience of doing the interview the interviewer gives

structure the interviewer starts with an explanation of the purpose of the interview and rounds off at the end for example by asking if the interviewee has

any questions or has anything to add the interviewer is clear the questions that they ask askk are simple

easy and short they don't use jargon the interviewer is gentle they let people finish what they're saying they give the interviewee time to finish

they tolerate pauses they give people time to think and don't interrupt them too quickly the interviewer is sensitive the interviewer listens

attentively to what he said and the interviewer empathizes in dealing with the interviewee the interviewer is open the interviewer responds to what is

important for the interviewee the interviewer is flexible in the way that the questions are asked and response to the issues raised by the

interviewee however the interviewer also needs to be steering inter needs to know what he or she wants to find out they use questions and prompts and probes to get the

information they're interested in for their research the interviewer is critical not so much disagreeing or even agreeing with the interviewee but rather the

interviewer is prepared to challenge what is said to them for example inconsistencies or ambiguities in what the interview says the interviewer remembers

especially the interviewer should remember what has already been said earlier on in the interview they can relate back what is discussed now to what has been previously said and they

avoid asking things of the interviewee that the interviewer has already talked about the interviewer interprets the interviewer can clarify and extend the meaning of what the

interviewee says sometimes they may do this by summarizing for the interviewee what they have just said to Kara's list priman adds two more

criteria the interviewer should be balanced they shouldn't talk too much which might make the interviewee passive and do not talk too l little which may result in the interviewee feeling that

he or she is not talking along the right lines the interviewer is ethically sensitive that is the interviewer is sensitive to the ethical dimension of interviewing ensuring the interviewee

appreciates what the research is about its purposes and that his or her answers will be treated confidentially what follows is a short video of an interview that falls down on

many of these criteria see how many you can spot first you'll see the video without interruption and then you'll see it again with some comments from me where I

think it is falling down on some of the criteria hello hi come here here come in sit down thanks for um Coming to talk to me

today um how long have you been driving Amanda uh 13 years right and and and what's what's driving like for you um

usually I enjoy it but sometimes it's stressful right oh okay and and and what was it like learning to drive and how long did it take you um learning to

drive it was nerve-wracking um and was it was it stressful then taking your test yeah it was stressful

you was really nervous right okay thanks for thanks for talking to me today L now let's see that again

hello M hi come in come in sit down thanks for um Coming to talk to me today um how long have you been driving

Amanda well that was a very brief introduction the interviewer didn't explain the context of the interview who she was or what the research was about and there was no consideration of any

ethical issues at all um how long have you been driving Amanda uh 13 years right and and and what's what's daging

like for you notice the lack of eye contact here the interviewer seems to be simply reading the questions she's not making any attempt to build any kind of rapport with the

interviewee and and and what's what's draging like for you um usually I enjoy it but sometimes it's stressful right okay notice that the

interviewer just simply accepts the short answers to her question and makes no attempts to give any prompts or any follow-up questions for example she could ask the interviewee

why driving is enjoyable or even better ask her to give an example of when it's enjoyable and and and what was it like learning to drive and how long did it take you change of topic but a much

better question what was it like however is then spoiled by the second question how long did it take um learning to drive was nerve-wracking

um and was it was it stressful then taking your chest notice the long pause here the interviewee is clearly thinking about the stress of learning to drive

but the interviewer offers no probe at this point no further investigation and in fact next the question changes the topic again to the test itself was it

was it stressful then taking the test yeah it was stressful was really nervous right the question about stress invites a yes or no answer and that's exactly

what the interviewer gets it needs a follow-up question about for example why was it stressful but this is not forthcoming okay thanks for thanks for talking to me today

Alando and so the interview ends rather suddenly without the interviewer having found out very much at all about what Amanda the interviewee thinks about

driving or learning to drive notice that the interviewee Amanda seems rather ill at ease and is not very forthcoming with information the interview also ends very

suddenly there's no chance for the interviewee to add anything else which she might have thought of now let's look at the second version of the interview where the interviewer makes a much better job of addressing

some of the problems I've outlined in the case of the first interview notice also how she makes a much better job of establishing a rapport with the interviewee and a consequence Mally gets

much more information about what she thinks about driving and learning to drive helloand come in come in hi sit down make yourself

comfortable thanks for coming along today to talk to me I hope that this sort of experience of us of us going to this interview this afternoon will be um

Pleasant and un interesting for both of us as you know the sort of the aim of the research really is to find out a little bit more about um what people's

experience of driving is light particularly learning to drive and events around learning to drive light um taking your test for example and um as I

explained before in the in the participant information sheet the reason that I've asked you is is because I'm aware that um that uh you're a driver and I wanted to find out a little bit

more about what your own personal experience of of learning to drive has been about now I'm not expecting the interview to last very long probably

only about uh 10 minutes also um and I just need to check out a few things with you before you you get started I know that when we spoke earlier you agreed to take part in the

interview but I just want to check that that's still okay with with you yes why great that's brilliant now it's important to let you know that if you want to stop at any time or you want to

take a break you can and if I was to ask you a question that you didn't want to answer you know please feel free to just say I'm I'm sorry I don't want to talk about that that's absolutely

fine um and as we agreed earlier the whole purpose of of of using this interview will be for the research but also to use the interview for teaching

purposes can I just check that's that's okay F lovely thanks um do you have any questions for me before we get started no I think I'm happy you okay right

that's lovely then okay can you tell me how long you've been driving I've been driving for 13 years right gosh 13 years okay and can you tell me um something

about the feelings that you associate with driving um I think mainly when I'm driving I really enjoy the freedom that I can just go where I want when when I

want and um although it can be stressful when you get stuck in traffic but when you go on public transport you're very much waiting around and it cannot turn up and that's really frustrating so I

really like the freedom that it gives me yeah and you mentioned there about stress and and it feeling stressful can you perhaps give me a bit of an example or tell me about a time when just like

when you can get stuck behind someone who's really slow or there's a really bad traffic and there's nothing you can do you're just stuck there and can make you late and but you you can't do

anything you just have to wait till the traffic moves on that can be annoying right okay that's great thanks one of the things that I'm particularly

interested in finding out about are people's memories of their experiences and in particular the sort of stories that people tell of events

that might happen to them or their experiences of of of certain times in their lives and I'm I particularly want to ask you about that in relation to your driving

behavior um what I'd like to ask you to do is to to think back to a specific point in time when you were learning to

drive maybe a specific experience or um maybe a particular lesson and um and and tell me a little bit about that um why I can remember when I was learning to

drive I was learning to drive in my car but my mom had lent it to a friend because obviously I couldn't drive on the road at the time and so the deal was that they T me they took me out for

practice every week and they got to borrow the car of course it caused a bit of a clash of interest because it wasn't in their interest for me to pass my test because then they'd have to give the car

back so um when I was learning to drive I kind of it it made it a bit uncomfortable because he you know I was kind of aware of that and I felt

sometimes he was a bit undermining of of my rather encouraging me because he you know he had his own like I'm saying he probably didn't want to have to give a

car back and I can also remember um you know I was he was really nervous eating sweets because I I'd go too fast I remember approaching a jaw Carriage Way

too quickly and literally screeching like in a movie round just barely barely having control of the car so uh I think

he tolerated quite a few incidents is near misses and stuff right near misses that's interesting tell me about it what about a near Miss well just you know the

driving a bit too fast having to break heavily and just inexperience really and learning to have control of the car okay so is that that's two quite separate

feelings remember when I asked you in the question before you were talking about um a feeling of Freedom that uh driving gives you now does that compare

to that feeling and that feeling of um that you're on about there about me and mrss I think um you know I was desperate to pass my test because I lived in a

small village right um miles away from nearest town so it was really important for me to be able to drive to get to college so I think there was sort of a really anxiousness to to pass and yet

you know learning to control a car can be really you know difficult understanding how gears and stuff work and how you know learning what the

speeds you should approach corners and whatever so so um I think you know I was looking forward to passing my test so I'd have that

freedom great that's that's great thanks um okay what I'd like to do now is get you to think back to the driving test itself yeah um take some time to think

about how you felt at the time of your test and maybe about some of the events that happened in your test and tell me the story of the test perhaps by

starting at the beginning and working your way through to the end right well I can remember um on my test um you know just as we got out of the test center I

stalled I think everybody does that so I was really nervous so I think they kind of overlooked that and then um I can remember you know I was doing my best

cuz as I said I was really Keen to part and get on with driving and I can remember um thinking it was my first test and you

know most people don't pass their first test so that made you know I think in a way that makes you think well you know maybe I won't pass or just do my best

and uh I can remember approaching roundabout and there was a cyclist in the middle of the roundabout and I was really being really careful not to knock over Cy really checking and and

everything and I forgot to Signal when I left the roundabout and I thought oh you know he's going to Mark me down that but I actually think when I look back on it I think he was really impressed I was

really concerned about um being careful around the cyclist and making sure I didn't cut them up and stuff and so I

think that was in my although I forgot to do that I think it was impressed on how I handled the situation and um I was glad that I didn't have to do um parallel parkings I found that really

difficult I think I did a 3o turn so that was a relief cuz I really struggled on that and so you know apart from store at the beginning and stuff I think it went okay and I was really pleased I

passed right oh great it's passed first time yeah oh smashing that's wonderful okay so you mentioned um you know uh that time when you were going

around the roundabout and you were trying to avoid the cyclist what kind of feelings uh were going on for you then I think I was more concerned about not

hitting the cyclist rather than thinking about signaling which was you know when you think of what testing that you have to do you looking your mirrors and signaling maneuvering everything and uh

but I think he was impressed but I was more concerned about the cyclist rather than you know the Maneuvers when I could done something wrong and had an accident

so so I think that was in my favor yeah did it how did it feel when you found out you passed then I was exhilarated I was so happy I went straight home and uh

went around to the friend's house tell about pass the test can I have the car please I like great well done you know but yeah it was great and I went off for

a drive and really really felt free at last I could go off and do things so yeah I was for a week I was like anyone want to live some the shop so yeah yeah that's

great great uh thanks every so much for sharing that with me and talking to me about your experience that's really all the questions that that I have for you

do you have any questions that you want to ask me no I think Happ okay that's thanks

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