ABSTRACT
Interviewing is probably the most widely used method of investigating the social world. However, the actual interview formats adopted by social researchers vary widely. Interviewing carried out by ethnographers whose principal research strategy is participant observation is often virtually unstructured, that is, very close to a ‘naturally occurring’ conversation. However, even in such unstructured interviews ethnographers have in mind topics they wish to explore and questions they would like to pose; thus they tend to direct the conversation with the research in mind, without imposing much structure on the interaction. Furthermore, unstructured interviews nearly always take place between individuals who share more than simply the interview encounter; usually the ethnographer will have established an ongoing relationship with the person being interviewed, one that precedes the encounter and will continue after it. Thus points made during the interview are usually with reference to both a shared history of a relationship and with awareness of a future connection. At the other extreme is the structured interview frequently employed in conducting survey research. In the structured interview, a series of predetermined questions are asked, often by interviewers other than the researcher, trained to use invariant wording and to standardize forms of clarification and other responses to queries by interviewees. These interviewees may be allowed considerable freedom in answering, but in the most highly structured formats they will be asked to select their answers from a set of possible responses provided by the interviewer. Usually the interview is a one-off occurrence, and there is no presumption of a continuing relationship between interviewer and interviewee.
