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Since a semi-structured interview is a combination of an unstructured interview and a structured interview, it has the advantages of both. The interviewees can express their opinions and ask questions to the interviewers during the interview, which encourages them to give more useful information, such as their opinions toward sensitive issues, to the qualitative research.
Interviews are considered to be "the most common method of gathering data for qualitative research"; further, they "are an integral part of most research traditions." [ 16 ] Interviews may be structured, semi-structured, or unstructured. [ 16 ]
Qualitative research usually uses unstructured or semi-structured techniques to collect data, e.g. in-depth interviews or group discussions, while quantitative research only uses structured techniques such as online questionnaires, on-street or telephone interviews.
One form of unstructured interview is a focused interview in which the interviewer consciously and consistently guides the conversation so that the interviewee's responses do not stray from the main research topic or idea. [3] Interviews can also be highly structured conversations in which specific questions occur in a specified order. [4]
An example of this dynamism might be when the qualitative researcher unexpectedly changes their research focus or design midway through a study, based on their first interim data analysis. The researcher can even make further unplanned changes based on another interim data analysis.
Used in qualitative research, the interviews involve a group of people who are asked about their perceptions, attitudes, opinions, beliefs, and views regarding many different topics (e.g., abortion, political candidates or issues, a shared event, needs assessment). Group members are often free to talk and interact with each other.
Semi-structured interviews constitute a middle ground: they include both predetermined questions and questions not planned in advance. [4] [77] [78] Structured interviews make it easier to compare the responses of the different participants and to draw general conclusions. However, they also limit what may be discovered and thus constrain the ...
A structured interview (also known as a standardized interview or a researcher-administered survey) is a quantitative research method commonly employed in survey research. The aim of this approach is to ensure that each interview is presented with exactly the same questions in the same order. This ensures that answers can be reliably aggregated ...