The Top Questions We Hear Regarding In-Depth Interviews
Article by Patrick Fiorenza, RMS Director of Research Analytics –
When working with our clients, questions frequently arise regarding in-depth interviews. Qualitative work is a passion of mine, and I welcome the opportunity to chat with clients about qualitative research and discuss perspectives on the approach and even get into the weeds to talk about methodology and techniques.
People often associate research with precision, accuracy, and words like valid and trustworthy. All those words are great descriptors, but research tends to be much muddier. Working in this field for as long as I have, I find myself often saying, “Well, it depends…” and then working with a client to get more detailed information so I can give a proper recommendation. At times, research feels more like defending assumptions or choices, rather than following a clean-cut playbook. Perhaps that’s just my perspective. There are certainly standards and well-established theories, but implementing the right methodology or theory is seldom a linear process; there’s a lot of depth and expertise your research vendor should be considering prior to making a recommendation.
Should I do qualitative or quantitative research?
I love getting to the bottom of this question. The first response is always, “it depends,” and really boils down to research objectives and what you are interested in learning. At the highest level, if you’re interested in identifying broad themes, patterns and understanding a process, you might want to do qualitative work. If you’re interested in testing a hypothesis, statistical significance, or making statistical inferences, go with quantitative. However, I’ll add that the research community often does a disservice to the statistical viability of qualitative research. It looks and feels different from quantitative approaches, but qualitative research has several true and tested methods to establish credibility and statistically relevant findings.
Should I do qualitative or quantitative research first?
There’s some debate on this question within the market research community; some are in the camp of always qual then quant, others quant then qual. I am skeptical of those that always pick one way over the other. You need to really understand the study objectives and needs before making the qual or quant decision. Experienced researchers will know the right questions to ask and then reflect on the answers to determine the right approach. In the most general sense, if you are working to generate a theory, go qualitative first to create your hypothesis, then quantitative to test it. If you have a pre-determined test, go quant and then qual to validate.
Who should moderate the interviews?
Conducting qualitative research is not an easy practice – it goes way beyond reading a script verbatim. Significant preparation needs to occur prior to conducting an interview. It’s not the same as having a conversation and it requires years of experience to learn then perfect techniques and strategies to get the best information possible. Young researchers should rely on the carefully constructed script, but a seasoned interviewer is often using the script as a guide and allowing the conversation to “emerge” by using probes and prompts to dive deeper into the topic of conversation. Sometimes clients have asked if they can “do a couple” interviews. Again, it all depends on context. There are some cases where this could be a very effective tool and a useful way to gain more insightful data or to test a script (or, perhaps, manage a budget restraint). In other cases, as you can imagine, having a client conduct an interview would lead to poor data quality, bias, and open the study up to a lot of risks regarding validity and trustworthiness.
How large does the sample need to be?
Some of the literature I have read states that interviews can stop once themes/comments/patterns become “saturated” or “exhausted.” So, if you hear the same comments over and over after 20 interviews, it’s a judgment call whether you end or continue with more research. If you’re the only researcher doing the IDIs, you can get a good sense of this. However, if you’re working on a team, it’s critical to be talking with the other researchers to best understand themes and determine sample size. The decision also depends on some factors that RMS can help sort out, such as the size of the target population and the client’s budget.
How long should the IDI take?
There is no hard and fast rule for the length of time an IDI should take. It depends on the methodology and type of IDI you are conducting. An in-depth ethnographic study could take over an hour. A short, a experience-based IDI might take just 15 minutes. Typically, the market research interviews I have done last about 20-25 minutes, but on occasion, they’ve lasted close to an hour.
Can the client be present during the interview?
We get this question quite a bit and, with IDIs, our answer is usually a polite “no.” The client’s presence inserts another dynamic into the interview that needs to be managed and often removes the advantage we have as an independent third-party researcher. However, we don’t immediately rule this out; we work with the client to understand why they want to be included. All our interviews are recorded so, with the consent of a participant, we can share the audio with the client. We can also share our notes and transcripts with the client to ensure we are asking the right questions.
What kind of analysis will take place?
Time, budget, rigor desired – these all impact the type of analysis that will take place. Depending on the topic, there might be specific methodologies to employ that are standard practice within the field. You may need to use different coding strategies, and if you’re working on a team, there are a variety of great strategies to ensure consistency among researchers. One of the biggest tips and takeaways you must remember is that analysis for your next interview has already begun. Why? Because the person conducting the interview—you!—has a particular worldview, biases, and perspectives that explicitly and implicitly impact the research. If you are serious about doing qualitative research, you need to consider doing some deep self-reflection to understand your biases and how they shape your analysis. If you really want to learn more about mitigating your preconceptions in qualitative studies, look up bracketing in qualitative research. It’s a powerful tool, and extremely important in qualitative research.
IDIs are a powerful tool for market research projects. They often work well in tandem with other modes of research, such as focus groups, surveys, or mystery shopping. Working with a trusted vendor who can support you through the entire research process is critical, giving confidence the right methodology is selected.
RMS Relational Information:
Lessons from the Field: How to Conduct an In-Depth Interview
RMS ViewPoint Panel: Helping You Make Better Decisions
4 Benefits of Mixed-Mode Market Research
About the Author – Patrick Fiorenza
Patrick is passionate about helping clients achieve their goals and designing effective strategies through customized market research projects. He has extensive experience in survey design, data analysis, and qualitative, quantitative, and mixed-methods research. As the Director of Research Analytics, Patrick monitors all aspects of the research project, assuring validated and high-quality results are provided to RMS clients. He is also passionate about providing coaching to analytic staff and collaborating closely with clients to ensure needs are met. Pat holds a master’s in public administration from Syracuse University and is pursuing his doctorate in curriculum, instruction, and science of learning from the University at Buffalo.
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About RMS
Research & Marketing Strategies, Inc. (RMS) is a full-service market research firm in Central New York. Formed in 2002, RMS helps organizations that are looking to know more about their customers and/or potential customers. We conduct surveys, focus groups, mystery shopping, studies, and analyses. Each project is customized and gets personal attention so that actionable, data-driven findings are delivered. RMS has a reputation for getting results. We offer an independent, professional means to conduct telephone, on-line, and mail surveying, as well as in-depth interviews, intercept interviews, and participant recruitment. We also host discussion groups through QualiSight, our onsite call center and focus group facility. We have a proven reputation for successfully recruiting and moderating focus groups, community forums, and town meetings.