evaluate structured interviews (20)

Question 1

intro

Answer 1

-structured interviews have a rigid interview schedule: a list of questions or topic areas the interviewer wishes to cover
-they are structured and pre-coded questionnaires, which means that the same questions are asked to the respondents by the researcher who records the responses

Question 2

practical (strength)

Answer 2

-the practicality of a research method refers to how easy it is to conduct, looking at access to location, funding, time, and ppts
-structured interviews are more practical than unstructured interviews as they are not as time consuming. Unstructured interviews require the interviewer to partake in extensive training whereas structured interviews have set questions that are read the same to every respondent, making them practically easy to conduct

Question 3

ethics (weakness)

Answer 3

-the BSA issued a “statement of ethical conduct” which encourages researchers to consider ethical issues such as harm, deception, privacy and confidentiality of the ppt. Ethical research must consider the impact the study may have on both the ppts and the researcher themselves
-structured interviews may be considered intimidating as there is someone face to face discussing potentially sensitive topics. This removes the complete anonymity. Questionnaires and unstructured interviews work better for sensitive topics

Question 4

theory (weakness)

Answer 4

-Interpretivism is an approach to social research that emphasises the need to understand people’s beliefs, attitudes, and motives towards their actions to better understand society
-Interpretivists believe that human behaviour is complex and cannot be reduced down to simple cause and effect relationships, and therefore prefer qualitative methods of research (eg. unstructured interviews)
-Interpretivists dislike structured interviews as a research method as they do not allow for verstahen

Question 5

reliability (strength)

Answer 5

-reliability refers to the repeatability of a study: if a study were to be replicated it would produce the same results
-as all the questions are set and predetermined, they are asked in the exact same way to every ppt, making structured interviews a highly reliable research method.

Question 6

representativeness (strength)

Answer 6

-representativeness refers to the extent in which a sample mirrors the researcher’s target population and reflects it’s characteristics
-structured interviews take much less time to conduct than unstructured interviews, meaning many more people can be interviewed, increasing the sample greatly. Interviews also allow us to access the samples that questionnaires do not, for example people with low literacy rates
-eg. the NatCen Health Survey for England included ppts from every age group , providing representative research for everyone across England, regardless of age

Question 7

validity (weakness)

Answer 7

-the validity of a research method refers to how detailed and accurate the study’s results are
-structured interviews gather quantitative data as respondents cannot expand on their answers, meaning the data will lack detail and will not provide an in-depth understanding as to why they answered the way they did