The structured interview. besides known as the formal or questionnaire interview. involves a face-to-face or instead an over-the-phone bringing of a questionnaire. Structured interviews use a pre-set list of inquiries designed by the research worker and asked to all interviewees in the same manner. this is know as an interview agenda. Interviewees so choose from a list of set replies. leting structured interviews to be comparatively speedy. Structured interviews have assorted advantages. therefore. some sociologists. chiefly Positivist sociologists. take to utilize structured interviews when carry oning research.
Positivists go by the premise that there is a mensurable nonsubjective societal world. They take a scientific attack utilizing methods such as structured interviews to obtain quantitative informations. Positivists are chiefly interested in research methods that achieve their chief ends of dependability. generalisability and representativeness. for this ground. they favour structured interviews as they achieve these ends. This is because structured interviews have close-ended inquiries and replies that are standardised. counted and quantified ; they are dependable because they can be hence replicated. Positivist sociologists besides prefer to utilize structured interviews when carry oning research because the pre-coded responses mean that produce quantitative informations. can let cause-and-effect relationships can be established. Thus. structured interviews are preferred by rationalists.
Besides. structured interviews are representative and can hence be generalised. because of the fact that they are frequently large-scale. There are besides practical advantages to utilizing structured interviews. For an illustration. preparation interviewers is comparatively easy and cheap as no specializer accomplishments have to be taught as the inquiries tend to be really straightforward as they frequently close-ended. and do non necessitate excessively much idea. Due to the fact that accomplishments taught are minimum. the procedure of developing interviewers will non be excessively much. This brings a immense practical advantage for sociologists of structured interviews being low cost.
Another practical advantage is that structured interviews are comparatively inexpensive. speedy and easy to administrate. This enables sociologists to utilize a larger sample in the interview procedure. leting more representative consequences to be produced. Therefore. the research worker can do generalizations. No merely this. but structured interviews have a higher response rate. than mail-clad questionnaires for illustration. farther improving and reenforcing the representative advantage of structured interviews.
Furthermore. face to confront interviews guarantee a much higher response rate than mailed questionnaires for illustration. due to the fact that the researcher’s presence means that the research intent and importance can be explained to possible interviewees. leting them to understand how valuable it is that their response is right and true. therefore increasing validity- an of import advantage for sociologists.
Finally interviewer consequence occurs when the interviewer’s presence affects the interviewee’s responses. in bend cut downing cogency. However. the advantage with structured interviews is that the interviewer consequence with be much less than with unstructured. open-ended unstructured interviews. This is due to the fact that in structured interviews contact is restricted to inquiring and reacting fixed list of inquiries and close-ended replies.
All points considered there are a figure of advantages for sociologists in utilizing structured interviews in their research. However. in stating this. it can besides be argued that there are a besides figure of disadvantages. For illustration. it can be said that there is a deficiency of cogency as the research worker decides the inquiries in progress. a deficiency of dependability as interviewer consequence may act upon replies. a cost issue due to developing and ignorance towards sensitive issues as expressionless mode may be rather off-putting and there is a deficiency of resonance.
In my sentiment. it all depends on whether you are a rationalist or an interpretivist. Yes. there are some disadvantages. but I believe that these disadvantages are highly outweighed by figure of advantages that exist for sociologists in utilizing structured interviews in their research.
