Types of interviews Flashcards
Q: Structured Interview – Practical Strength (Speed and Standardisation)
A: Structured interviews use standardised questions, allowing quick data collection. → Positivists support this for generating large-scale, comparable data. → It allows researchers to compare how different families influence pupils (e.g. via cultural/social capital). → This means it is efficient for identifying patterns across class or ethnicity. → However, lacks flexibility to follow up on detailed responses.
Q: Structured Interview – Theoretical Limitation (Lacks verstehen and depth)
A: Structured interviews restrict respondents to set answers. → Interpretivists argue this lacks depth and misses the meaning behind parental involvement. → Parents might want to explain attitudes shaped by their own education or values. → This means less insight into how support differs culturally or emotionally. → Counterpoint: Useful for establishing surface-level trends across large groups.
Q: Structured Interview – Ethical Strength (Transparency and Consent)
A: Structured interviews are overt and standardised, minimising deception. → This makes it easier to gain informed consent from parents, teachers, or older pupils. → This means the method aligns with ethical guidelines for researching family dynamics. → Counterpoint: The formal tone may still create discomfort or inhibit honesty.
Q: Structured Interview – Practical Limitation (Language and Misinterpretation)
A: Parents from some ethnic or working-class backgrounds may struggle with formal interview language. → This creates response bias or lower-quality data. → This means reliability may suffer if respondents misunderstand questions. → Counterpoint: Interviewers can clarify terms if confusion arises, improving understanding.
Q: Structured Interview – Theoretical Limitation (Social Desirability Bias)
A: Parents may present themselves as supportive, regardless of truth. → Labelling theory suggests parents fear judgement or stigma. → This means data may reflect idealised parenting, not actual involvement. → Interpretivists argue this compromises validity. → Counterpoint: Anonymised interviews can reduce bias and increase honesty.
Q: Structured Interview – Conclusion (Usefulness in Family Research)
A: Structured interviews are useful for measuring surface-level patterns in parental involvement. → They align with positivist aims of generalisability and reliability. → But they may miss depth, meaning, and cultural nuance. → This means they are best combined with qualitative methods (e.g. unstructured interviews) to capture full understanding.
Q: Unstructured Interview – Theoretical Strength (Verstehen and Rapport)
A: Unstructured interviews allow pupils to speak freely about personal experiences. → Interpretivists favour this method for building rapport and accessing deeper meanings. → It helps understand how streaming affects self-esteem and motivation. → This means richer insight into emotional impacts of labelling and ability grouping. → Counterpoint: Responses are hard to compare and quantify.
Q: Unstructured Interview – Ethical Strength (Sensitivity and Empathy)
A: Pupils discussing their stream placement may feel vulnerable or judged. → Unstructured interviews offer space for empathy and follow-up questions. → This means distress can be minimised and emotional wellbeing respected. → Ethical research with children must prioritise emotional safety. → Counterpoint: Safeguarding protocols are still essential.
: Unstructured Interview – Practical Limitation (Time and Access)
A: Interviews take a long time and usually involve small samples. → Schools may be reluctant to let researchers take time from lessons. → This means it’s harder to gain access and collect large-scale data. → Counterpoint: Smaller studies can still uncover powerful individual stories.
Q: Unstructured Interview – Theoretical Limitation (Lack of Reliability and Bias)
A: The open nature of interviews means each conversation is unique. → Positivists criticise this for being hard to replicate or compare. → Researcher presence may also introduce bias. → This means data lacks reliability and generalisability. → Counterpoint: Rich detail can offer insights missed by quantitative methods.
Q: Unstructured Interview – Conclusion (Usefulness in Streaming Research)
A: Unstructured interviews are valuable for exploring how pupils feel about streaming. → They align with interpretivist aims of verstehen and individual context. → But their subjectivity and small scale limit generalisability. → This means they are best combined with broader quantitative methods (e.g. questionnaires) for triangulation.
Q: Group Interview – Practical Strength (Peer Encouragement and Flow)
A: Boys may open up more when discussing academic challenges with peers present. → Group interviews reduce pressure by encouraging natural conversation. → This helps gather insights into attitudes toward school, masculinity, and achievement. → This means richer data on peer dynamics and cultural resistance. → Counterpoint: Stronger voices may dominate discussion.
Q: Group Interview – Theoretical Strength (Contextual Validity and Insight)
A: Discussing with peers can reveal shared norms around anti-school attitudes. → Interpretivists value the insight into how boys collectively construct meaning. → It helps explain why working-class boys might reject academic success. → This means stronger understanding of subcultures and identity. → Counterpoint: Social desirability bias may occur in front of peers.
Q: Group Interview – Practical/Ethical Limitation (Disruption and Consent).
A: Group settings can be unpredictable and hard to manage in schools. → Pupils may disrupt or go off-topic. → Getting informed consent from all members is more complex. → This means increased risk of ethical or safeguarding breaches. → Counterpoint: Skilled facilitation can reduce these risks
Q: Group Interview – Theoretical Limitation (Reliability and Peer Influence)
A: Group dynamics may reduce the reliability of responses. → Peer pressure can influence what boys share or hold back. → Positivists argue this reduces replicability and generalisability. → This means the findings may reflect performance, not real views. → Counterpoint: Data still useful for revealing peer identity construction.
Q: Group Interview – Conclusion - Usefulness for Researching Boys’ Underachievement
A: Group interviews are useful for exploring how boys understand and explain underachievement. → They offer access to peer culture and shared norms. → But they carry risks of bias, disruption, and ethical complexity. → This means they work best when combined with other methods (e.g. observations or individual interviews).
