Structured interviewing

Closed questions mean that the ‘conversation’ comes to a close because of the nature of the answer expected. This implies asking questions with a fixed number of possible responses, from which the respondent chooses their preferred answer. The irony for answer (b) is that respondents actually allocate themselves into categories through their responses. Since there are a fixed number of responses, more detail cannot be obtained with this type of question, which may be a disadvantage. Yet, in order to promote validity, researchers are strongly encouraged to restrict their interviews to closed-ended questions.
Reference: Bryman: Social Research Methods: 5th Edition Page(s) 200

It is important to stick to the order of the questions as determined in the interview schedule, for a number of reasons. One fairly obvious reason is that if we skip a question, for whatever reason, we may forget to come back to it. Another concerns the logical progression of the question order, whereby a later question may predispose a respondent to answering an earlier question somewhat differently than might have been the case spontaneously. This particularly applies to questions of a more sensitive nature, which should be left till later in the interview, or those that strike the respondent as being more meaningful to them, more salient, which really should come early in the interview. From both the respondent’s point of view and your own, it is more appropriate to group questions into categories than to leave them “scattered all over the place”. The respondent will get a sense of order and intelligence and you are more likely to be able to understand the face validity of your own questions, apart from making coding and data processing more straightforward. Far from expecting variation in the question order, you are sternly cautioned against it.
Reference: Bryman: Social Research Methods: 5th Edition Page(s) 208-210

A ‘response set’ is a type of behaviour pattern in which people answer questions consistently in the same manner, without particular regard for the question’s content stimulus. Two types of response set affect structured interviews, as Bryman discusses on page 216 and 217, being “acquiescence” and “social desirability”. Answer (b) points to this latter type of response, the suggested remedy being a phrasing of questions that avoids emotional overtones and avoiding judgemental behaviours in recording replies. Acquiescence is the tendency for some respondents to agree or disagree consistently, the suggested remedy here being reverse-ordering of the question or scales of agreement-disagreement, or by using double negatives in some questions. Since interviewer bias is a serious concern, perhaps the interviewer (of whichever sex) should be discreet in the dress and perfume worn, to avoid any extra-interview responses!
Reference: Bryman: Social Research Methods: 5th Edition Page(s) 216-217

Like many other acronyms, “CATI” could represent many phrases. In the context of structured interviewing in social research, CATI stands for “computer-assisted telephone interviewing”. Using this technique, the interviewer uses a computer with a pre-loaded questionnaire when making the call. Responses are then keyed in as appropriate, indicated by the question’s instructions and coding. This technique may save considerable amounts of time later, if a computer programme such as SPSS is used for data recording and analysis (see chapter 15), because data can be entered directly while phoning. “CAPI”, or “computer-assisted personal interviewing”, tries to bring the benefits of the computer to the face-to-face interview setting. It is easy to imagine extended use of small-scale computers as an aid to interviewing in the future.
Reference: Bryman: Social Research Methods: 5th Edition Page(s) 204

Before face-to-face interviewing, or telephone interviewing indeed, it is recommended that an introductory letter be sent to respondents. This will make the interview less of a ‘cold-call’ in general and may drive up the response rate for phone interviews. Why should a prospective respondent give you some of their valuable time, in any case? Many people are wary of sales-pitches disguised as “research” and will welcome an introduction explaining the nature of the research, your role, possible funders of the research, likely applications of the research. All respondents have the right to anonymity and confidentiality of personal data but it is seemly to remind them of those rights.
Reference: Bryman: Social Research Methods: 5th Edition Page(s) 207, Tips and skills

Most questions in a structured interview have in-built prompts because they have been closed by limiting the possible responses. However, it is often possible to show a list of possibilities on a card, hence the expression ‘show card’. Instructions will be given to interviewers before a particular question to “show card number 2”, for example. The value of a show card is that it can be used a number of times throughout an interview, particularly for lists that are longer than usual, or that might be too hard to keep in memory. All information on a show card could have been contained within the interview schedule itself, so it is not a situation where we show the cards to some respondents but not to others.
Reference: Bryman: Social Research Methods: 5th Edition Page(s) 214

All of these answers are ways in which interviewer variation is reduced. Although we can imagine a need to standardize interviewer behaviour across a number of separate interviewers, the concept applies to a single interviewer just as well. It is important to make sure that each respondent is asked the same questions, with the same phrasing, in the same order as every other respondent. Only in this way can we feel confident that no undue additional bias has crept into the process and that validity has not been impaired.
Reference: Bryman: Social Research Methods: 5th Edition Page(s) 200

The structured interview and the self-completion questionnaire are the two main ways of gathering quantitative data for social research. The same rules apply to each, with the obvious difference that interviews are conducted on a face-to-face basis. The procedure to be followed must be identical for each individual interview, so answer (a) cannot be correct. Far from increasing validity, this suggestion would destroy it! In-depth exploration of topics requires an unstructured interview, in which the respondent has the opportunity of expanding on particular points of view. It is probably easier to understand this by reflecting on the fact that structured interviews are frequently referred to as ‘standardized’ interviews. The questions, their ordering, and their accompanying instructions are standardized so that we can be sure that variation detected in the responses is credibly derived from the same instrument stimulus.
Reference: Bryman: Social Research Methods: 5th Edition Page(s) 198

Telephone interviewing is recommended as a way of overcoming constraints of time and money, so answer (a) is correct. However, people without phones cannot be reached in this way, which really is a disadvantage. Indeed, even when people are accessible by phone, they may not be inclined to answer as freely as in a face-to-face setting, partly because it is more difficult for the interviewer to establish rapport. Another disadvantage is that interviewers cannot use show cards while conducting a telephone interview, although with the increasing proliferation of web-cams this may be less of a disadvantage as time goes by. It is also worth noting that the use of mobile phones for interview surveys is also becoming more common which bring additional challenges.
Reference: Bryman: Social Research Methods: 5th Edition Page(s) 202

Generally speaking, filter questions are questions asked of some respondents but not of all. Usually the filter works like a branch in a decision tree, where we take one course of action if “yes” and another if “no” is the answer. Since there are separate courses of action, we don’t need to follow both. If respondents say “yes” to a question, we can then ask other questions which follow from that “yes” and avoid asking those same, irrelevant, questions of those answering “no”. Answer (a) indicates required practice in a structured interview but filter questions are designed to ensure that not every question is asked of everyone.
Reference: Bryman: Social Research Methods: 5th Edition Page(s) 208