Unstructured interviews

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  • Created by: Shadow
  • Created on: 22-12-20 15:59

Unstructured interviews

Advantages

  • Rapport and sensitivity- Allows the interviewer to form a rapport (relationship of trust and understanding) with the interviewee. This is more liekly to put the interviewee at their ease and encourga ethem to open up than a formal structured interview.
  • William Labov (1973)- Used a formal interview technique to study the langauge of black American children, Labov found that they appeared to be tongue-tied and `linguistically deprived`. However, adopting a more relaxed, informal style- the interviewer sitting on the floor, the child is allowed to have a friend present- brought a completely different repsnse. Children were more open and spoke freely to show that they were competent speakers.
  • The interviewee`s view- There are no set of questions. Unstructed interviews allows the interviewee to have an opportunity to speak about yhose things they think are important. This contasts with thr dtructed interview, where the resesrcher decides in advance what questions are worth asking and limits interviewees to a fixed range of possible answers.
  • Checking understanding- They make it easier for the interviewer and interviewee to check eacj#h other`s menaings.
  • If the interviewee doesn't understand the question, it can be explained.
  • If the interviewer is unsure what the interviewee`s answer means, follow up questions can be put to clarify matters.
  • Flexibility- They are highly flexible and the interviewer is not restricted to a fixed set of questions in advance, but can explore whatever seems interesting or relevant. The researcher can formulate new ideas and hypothesis and then put them to the test as they arise duirng the course of the interview. There is no need to go away and draw up a new interview schedule, as there would be if uisng strucutred interviews.
  • Exploring unfamiliar topics- Researcher`s need to have some knowledge of the subject and preferbly also a clear hypothesis before they start interviewing: otherwise, they will have little idea of what questions to ask

Disadvantages

  • Practical problems-( Time and sample size) They take a long time to conduct and limits the number that can be carried out and that the researcher will have a small sample compared with the largwe numbers who can be studied using structured interviews or quesitonaires.
  • (Training) The interviewer needs to have a background in sociology so they can recongise when the interviewee has amde a soicologically important point and so they can probe fruther with an appropirate line of quesitoning.
  • Representativeness- Smaller numbers involved mean it is more likely that the sample interviewed will not be representative. This means that it will be harder to make valid generlisations based on the findings of the interviewers.
  • Reliability-They are not standardised. Each interview is unique: interviewers are free to ask different questions in each case if they feel it is relevant to do so. This make sit impossible for the researcher to replicate the interviews and check findings or compare them with their own.
  • Quantification-They mainly use open-ended questions, but the answers cannot be pre-coded. This makes it very difficult to count up and quantify of interviewees giving this or that answer. The lack of quantitative data makes unstructured interviews less useful for establishing cause-and-effect relationships and hypothesis testing that positivists prefer.
  • Validity- They produce valid data. However, critics argue that the fact that they invlove an interaction between the interviewer and interviewee inevitably colours and distorts the information obtianed.

Evaluation

They uses open ended questions, producing valid data by allowing interviewees to express themselves fully. However they are less representative and quantification is difficult.

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