Review of Interviews as a research tool

Interviewer:

I chose to interview an experienced dance practitioner to gather information, opinions and personal experiences about differentiation.

It turned out to be a long process in setting up and organising a suitable time and date as with a busy work and family life her circumstance kept changing. This meant that the interview did not happen when first agreed but only took place a couple of weeks later. This was not too much of a problem at this stage but when it come to my actual research it will be important for me to get interview dates and times secured in advance as I will be working to a limited time scale, and moving things around could have a knock on effect on other research.

We met on neutral ground at a coffee shop. Although there were others around it was mid-week and so fairly quiet so we were able to find a quiet corner to conduct the interview. I used a semi structured approach which worked well as I was able to ask questions but it allowed the interviewee a lot of freedom when answering and I could follow anything interesting that came out of their answers which often overlapped into some of my prewritten questions anyway.

The interview was very relaxed and had a conversational feel despite there being some structure to it. On this occasion I didn’t not have a Dictaphone and so relied on hand written notes which although were useful I would have been able to recall much more detail had it been recorded. I will defiantly do this on any future occasions.

Interviewee:

I also volunteered myself to a fellow BAPP student to be an interviewed by them over the phone. I thought it would be interesting to see how it felt being interviewee as opposed to interviewer and whether it would bring me any further insight into the process.

Overall the style of the interview was fine, I felt happy to answer questions and I wanted to be as truthful as possible as I empathised with her cause.

Questions were in a good order, some of my answers overlapped (which may or may not have been intended when structuring the questionnaire), but it gave me chance to reaffirm any points I wanted to.

There were a couple of questions that needed further explanation, as I was unclear how to answer them and felt I needed more clarification before giving a response, but she was happy to do this and explain in more detail. This made me realise how important it is to word questions appropriately, and also to make sure they will have the same meaning for each person taking part so you can compare results accurately.

One thing that struck me which at first I thought could have been due to the fact it was conducted over the phone but now I think it could also be a factor in face to face interviews, was that sometimes i felt a little on the spot, and a little under pressure to give an answer. I am not sure whether some answers were just the first thing that came into my head, and if I had had more time to think over the questions perhaps I could of provided a more informed answer, more beneficial to the research. I came to the conclusion that had I had a copy of the questions in advance I would have had time to think about my answers and possibly give a better, more detailed and structured response.