ABSTRACT
The focus group interview of today takes many forms and is used not only in social science research but also in recruitment drives and more widely in marketing and publicity campaigns. Despite modifications to the techniques used by Merton in the post-war period, there remain many similarities between these and contemporary ‘in-depth group interviews’—of which focus groups are one variety. Goldman (1962) (quoted in Stewart and Shamdasani (1990:10)) defines this method of research technique by simple definition of the words ‘group’, ‘depth’ and ‘interview’:
A group is ‘a number of interacting individuals having a community of interest’; depth involves ‘seeking information that is more profound than is usually accessible at the level of inter-personal relationships’; and interview implies the presence of a moderator who ‘uses the group as a device for eliciting information’.
