Making Interviewees Feel Comfortable

The Interview Process Two strategies that could be used to address the issue of difficult participants within the interview process would be (a) the pilot study approach and (b) the interviewing the investigator approach (Chenail, 2011). Additionally, the computer mediated communication (CMC) approach can also be used to deal with difficult participants—especially those for whom it is hard to find the time to sit down for a face-to-face interview (Elmir, Schmied, Jackson & Wilkes, 2011).

CMC, such as email or instant messaging, would help to overcome the time and space barriers that typically present themselves as issues for participants who may have initially expressed interest in an interview but lack the time or ability to make it for a face-to-face interview. Participant C, for example, has been difficult to schedule and has attempted to withdraw from participation though he demonstrated initial interest.

CMC approach could be used to help Participant C contribute by simply submitting responses via email whenever the individual found the time to respond to the questions asked in the interview. This would take far less trouble and would not require a scheduled commitment on the part of the interviewee—just a few moments of time to answer the questions in email and hit the send button.

For the other two participants—A and B—using the pilot study approach and the interviewing the investigator approach would both be helpful. The pilot study approach allows the interviewer to ascertain whether or not the questions he has developed for the interview are capable of obtaining the desired information.

For instance, if an interviewer wants to obtain information on the participant’s experiences during a traumatic situation but asks questions that are not open-ended or that do not compel the interviewee to elaborate, the problem may be with the types of questions being asked. Perhaps they are closed-questions, meaning a response in the affirmative or negative is all that is required of the interviewee. Or perhaps they are just not well-worded questions and the interviewee does not see any need to give more information on the subject.

A pilot study would allow the interviewer to test the questions with a sample first and see how the sample responds to them. If adequate information is obtained, the interview questions are probably sufficient. If not, the interview questions may need to be reworked. It could be that Participant A is not being properly approached with good questions and that is why he does not expand on his responses and only gives one word answers.

At any rate, the pilot study can be used to generate feedback from participants to see which questions were effective and which were not (Chenail, 2011), and the researcher can build on that information to develop a good set of interview questions that will be effective in generating the kind of responses desired. However, there could also be environmental factors to consider, as Elmir et al. (2011) note.

If a participant does not feel comfortable in the surroundings provided by the researcher, there may be less willingness to participate in the interview and the interviewee may want to get through it as quickly as possible so as not to have to spend any more time than necessary in the room or environment. Therefore, it is important that the researcher also make sure that the environment in which the interview is conducted is comfortable and accommodating.

The goal is to help the interviewee feel willing to elaborate and give as much information on a topic as is possible. To this end, the interviewer should not make the interviewee feel like he is in a rush to get through the process. The interviewer should appear as calm and comfortable as he would like his interviewee to feel when doing the interview. This could also be helpful for Participant B who keeps going on off on tangents.

By controlling the environment, the researcher is more likely to demonstrate control of the interview. There is also the interviewing the investigator approach: “in the interviewing the investigator approach the researcher assumes the role of a study participant and enlists a colleague to conduct the interview or the investigator can play both the role of the interviewer and interviewee” (p. 258).

The purpose of this method is so that the researcher can see what the questions are like from the other side of the process—or, in other words, the researcher puts himself in the participant’s shoes. This gives the researcher better perspective on the interview questions so that they can honed and tweaked according to how well the researcher perceives them to be from his end as the interviewee.