Qualitative research interviews.

TLDR: Some of the major ideas that psychotherapy researchers using such interviews must consider both before and during the interview process are discussed and thoughts regarding approaches to strengthen qualitative interviews themselves are offered.

Abstract: After presenting a brief overview of the complexity of the qualitative interviewing process used by psychotherapy researchers, the authors discuss some of the major ideas that psychotherapy researchers using such interviews must consider both before and during the interview process. They then offer thoughts regarding approaches to strengthen qualitative interviews themselves.

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Qualitative Research Interviews
Sarah Knox
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Alan W. Burkard
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1
Qualitative Research Interviews
Sarah Knox
Department of Counseling and Educational Psychology
Marquette University
Milwaukee, WI
Alan W. Burkard
Department of Counseling and Educational Psychology
Marquette University
Milwaukee, WI
After presenting a brief overview of the complexity of the qualitative
interviewing process used by psychotherapy researchers, the authors discuss
some of the major ideas that psychotherapy researchers using such
interviews must consider both before and during the interview process. They
then offer thoughts regarding approaches to strengthen qualitative interviews
themselves.
Much of qualitative psychotherapy research relies on spoken
interviews with participants to gather detailed information regarding
the phenomenon under examination (Polkinghorne, 2005). In an
activity that calls on not only strong interviewing techniques but also
the very skills used when working with clients, interviewers confront
challenges inherent in both domains: How do they conduct an incisive
interview that yields rich and meaningful data while simultaneously
helping participants feel safe enough to explore in depth often difficult
experiences with a relative stranger? Perhaps complicating this
process, qualitative psychotherapy researchers also must attend to the

NOT THE PUBLISHED VERSION; this is the author’s final, peer-reviewed manuscript. The published version may be
accessed by following the link in the citation at the bottom of the page.
[Citation: Journal/Monograph Title, Vol. XX, No. X (yyyy): pg. XX-XX. DOI. This article is © [Publisher’s Name] and
permission has been granted for this version to appear in e-Publications@Marquette. [Publisher] does not grant
permission for this article to be further copied/distributed or hosted elsewhere without the express permission from
[Publisher].]
2
ethics of interviewing. (The ethics of interviewing are beyond the
scope of this article, but interested readers are encouraged to see
Haverkamp, 2005.) Such researchers, for instance, have often been
trained, and may even be credentialed, to address others’ distress.
When conducting research, however, they tread a sometimes difficult
line between interviewer and therapist, an ethical challenge that other
social science researchers may not face (Haverkamp, 2005). In this
article, we discuss important considerations that psychotherapy
researchers must address, both before and during the interview itself,
as they engage in this approach to data collection. We do so in the
hope that our discussion of these vital components of qualitative
interviewing will not only improve researchers’ execution of such
interviews themselves but will also strengthen qualitative research
more broadly. When possible, we integrate extant empirical evidence
and relevant theory and conclude by suggesting fruitful research
avenues for advancing our understanding of the qualitative interview
process. We acknowledge, as well, that our focus is not exhaustive:
There are certainly additional topics worthy of consideration, but we
have included those that have consistently been of most relevance in
our own research.
Considerations Before the Interview
Interview Protocol
Before any interview can occur, consideration must be given to
the very questions that will be asked, because "at the root of
...interviewing is an interest in understanding the experience of other
people and the meaning they make of that experience" (Seidman,
1991, p. 3). The means to access those experiences range widely,
from open-ended, unstructured approaches that may seem more a
friendly conversation than a data-gathering interview (Seidman, 1991)
to highly structured protocols with preset and standardized questions
from which there is little variance.
On one end of this continuum, then, are relatively unstructured
approaches (e.g., ethnography, grounded theory, phenomenology)
that may use an evolving set of questions, such that later participants
respond to queries quite different from those to which earlier

NOT THE PUBLISHED VERSION; this is the author’s final, peer-reviewed manuscript. The published version may be
accessed by following the link in the citation at the bottom of the page.
[Citation: Journal/Monograph Title, Vol. XX, No. X (yyyy): pg. XX-XX. DOI. This article is © [Publisher’s Name] and
permission has been granted for this version to appear in e-Publications@Marquette. [Publisher] does not grant
permission for this article to be further copied/distributed or hosted elsewhere without the express permission from
[Publisher].]
3
participants responded. As initial data are gathered and analyzed, they
lead to refinement of the study’s central focus and thus to new
questions for participants (Glaser & Strauss, 1967). Such an approach
is in keeping with the sentiments of Kvale (1996), who asserted that
the design of qualitative interview research is open ended in that it is
more concerned with being attuned to the participant than with
necessarily following the same path for all respondents. In
ethnography, for example, the interview is more a ‘‘friendly
conversation into which the researcher slowly introduces new elements
to assist informants to respond’’ (Spradley, 1979, pp. 58-59) and thus
retains an open framework with little in the way of preset queries. The
basic themes or topic areas of the investigation are likely determined
ahead of time, but not the sequence or the content of the specific
questions. As stated by Kvale (1996), ‘‘Sometimes only a first, topic-
introducing question is asked and the remainder of the interview
proceeds as a follow-up and expansion on the interviewee’s answer to
the first questions’’ ( p. 127). Unstructured interviews, although they
may well yield unexpected responses (Kvale, 1996), also make it
difficult to compare findings across cases if participants have not
responded to the same questions.
Occupying the middle of the continuum are semistructured
interviews, in which a protocol using open-ended questions based on
the study’s central focus is developed before data collection to obtain
specific information and enable comparison across cases; interviewers
nevertheless remain open and flexible so that they may probe
individual participants’ stories in more detail (DiCicco-Bloom &
Crabtree, 2006). The interviewer thus asks all questions of each
respondent but may pursue in more depth particular areas that
emerge for each interviewee (Hill et al., 2005; Hill, Thompson, &
Williams, 1997) and may also vary the sequence in which questions
are asked. The protocol in such semistructured interviews serves as a
guide (Flick, 2002), a foundation on which the interview is built but
one that allows creativity and flexibility to ensure that each
participant’s story is fully uncovered.
Finally, at the other end of the continuum are survey or
standardized interviews, in which the goal is to expose each
participant to exactly the same interview experience (Fontana & Frey,

NOT THE PUBLISHED VERSION; this is the author’s final, peer-reviewed manuscript. The published version may be
accessed by following the link in the citation at the bottom of the page.
[Citation: Journal/Monograph Title, Vol. XX, No. X (yyyy): pg. XX-XX. DOI. This article is © [Publisher’s Name] and
permission has been granted for this version to appear in e-Publications@Marquette. [Publisher] does not grant
permission for this article to be further copied/distributed or hosted elsewhere without the express permission from
[Publisher].]
4
2005) so that any differences are assumed to be due to variations
among participants rather than to differences in the interview process
itself (Singleton & Straits, 2002). To this end, such interviews follow a
highly structured protocol consisting most often of closed questions
(those that seek a definitive one-to two-word answer such as ‘‘yes’’ or
‘‘no’’ and are often used to ascertain facts) presented to respondents
in the same order. Furthermore, the interview process itself is highly
regulated (e.g., questions are read exactly as written, standard probes
are used, no interviewer disclosure is to occur), such that researchers
are neutral and consistent throughout all interviews (Fontana & Frey,
2005). In effect, then, ‘‘the goal is nothing less than the elimination of
the interviewer as a source of measurement error’’ (Groves, 1989, p.
358). Wholly standardized interviews have the potential advantage of
greater uniformity across respondents but inhibit the uncovering of
participants’ rich and unique experiences, especially those that lie
outside the bounds of the interview questions themselves.
Phone versus In-person Interviews
Another decision that qualitative interviewers face involves the
actual means of completing the interview: Should participants be
interviewed by phone or in person (i.e., face-to-face)? Little research
has compared the benefits of these means of data collection, likely
because, according to Shuy (2003), such studies are expensive and
difficult to carry out, and few researchers have been motivated to
examine the relative merits of the differing approaches. Two studies
that did examine phone versus in-person interviews found a slight
advantage for the latter in yielding better quality data (de Leeuw &
van der Zouwen, 1988; Jordan, Marcus, & Reeder, 1980). In a third
study, a meta-analysis focusing on participants’ responses to sensitive
topics in surveys, Tourangeau and Yan (2007) found that interviewers
contribute to participants’ misreporting because respondents have to
share their answers with another person (vs. with a computer or only
with themselves [as in a written survey]), and that social desirability
bias is worse in phone than in face-to-face interviews.
Despite the potential for such bias, phone interviews are quite
common. First, they enable researchers to include participants from
virtually any geographic region; no one is required to travel for the

Frequently asked questions

Q1. What are some cultural groups that prefer to have physical closeness when communicating with others?

For instance, some cultural groups (e.g., Africans, African Americans, Arabs, Latin Americans) prefer to have physical closeness when communicating with others, whereas other cultural groups (e.g., European Americans, Germans, Scandinavians) prefer more physical distance. 

Q2. What are the main factors that drive qualitative research?

All research methods are founded on philosophical beliefsregarding the acquisition and interpretation of data, and these beliefs drive qualitative researchers’ interview approach toward participants. 

Q3. What is the common assertion in support of in-person interviews?

one assertion frequently made in support of in-person interviews is that because both researcher and participant are in the same space, and thus have access to more than just verbal data, they can build the rapport that may enable participants to freely disclose their experiences more effectively than might occur in phone interviews (Shuy, 2003). 

Q4. What are the means to access those experiences?

The means to access those experiences range widely, from open-ended, unstructured approaches that may seem more a friendly conversation than a data-gathering interview (Seidman, 1991) to highly structured protocols with preset and standardized questions from which there is little variance. 

Q5. What are some examples of how researchers may minimize participant feelings?

For instance, researchers may minimize participant feelings, fail to respond to intense emotions, or even change topics to avoid addressing deep affect expressed by participants. 

Q6. What are some researchers who believe that therapeutic responses may influence participants’ interpretations of such events?

some researchers (e.g., Rennie, 1995; Seidman, 1991) believe that therapeutic responses may influence participants’ interpretations of such events, perhaps compromising the integrity of the data collected during an interview. 

Q7. What are some of the methods used to develop interviewer skills?

In their own research teams, then, the authors use a number of training methods to develop interviewer skills and readiness (i.e., reviewing the research protocol, practicing the interview process through role-plays, conducting practice and pilot interviews while under supervision, listening to recordings of more experienced interviewers, debriefing after actual interviews; also see Fassinger, 2005, for additional ideas).