The interviewer must be very well trained in order to note the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
In order to note the whole truth - everything about the participant's attitudes, feelings, expectations etc - the interviewer should notice everything the participant says. Also important is how they say it - voice inflections and pauses, and what they avoid saying. Beyond these voice and sound effects, the interviewer should notice all body language cues the interviewee manifests. Moreover, it is not enough for the interviewer to notice all this information, but they also need to take accurate notes of it. The interviewer should then accurately interpret all the information that needs interpretation, such as non-verbal communication: Wincing, folding arms, palms open/closed, leaning forward/backward, looking left/right and up/down, closing the eyes, making/avoiding eye contact, feet on ground stable/on-edge, fidgeting, playing with rings/hair, touching their own face - nose, eyes, mouth, ear, scratching here and there, grooming themselves, etc.
In order to note nothing but the truth, the interviewer must somehow see everything with objective eyes, not putting in any judgements, expectations, preferences or even benign thinking habits. The interviewer mustn't paraphrase, omit or add anything to what the participant says. This means that the field notes the interviewer takes must be complete. Otherwise the interviewer would have to rely on memory, which almost certainly will introduce unconscious selectivity and self-editing, compromising both the wholeness of truth and the nothingness but the truth. Even with my limited understanding of human beings, I can safely say that this is already beyond human capabilities.
The perfect interviewer should not only observe and note every aspect of the reactions of the participant, the interviewer should sometimes respond to the participant's behavior, without reacting to it. This means that the interviewer must consciously notice the participant’s feelings and attitudes as they are expressed by the participant’s verbal and non-verbal behavior. The interviewer then must mindfully decide how to behave towards the participant in such a way that will benefit the interview, and then actually act that way. This is in contrast to “reaction” which would be unconscious and unmindful, like being defensive if the participant is critical of something in the interview.
But that is not all. The well trained interviewer must avoid influencing the interviewee. neither by choice of words in the questions or between the questions, nor by voice inflections and pauses, nor by body-language. So the interviewer should be constantly aware and in control of what cues they are transmitting towards the participant. These cues may affect the interviewee, and we don't want that. The interviewer must appear impartial: Not to look as if they approve or disapprove of the interviewee’s responses. The interviewer must create and maintain the right amount of rapport: Enough to ensure the participant participates willfully, but not enough to make the participant change their responses in order to indulge the interviewer.
Of course the interviewer must not allow his or her emotions and interests to influence the interview. In the few times I was interviewed - usually on the telephone, I wasn't terribly impressed with the interviewers’ ability to lend themselves completely to the interview. Most often, their agenda of completing as many interviews as possible in a short time affected their voice (impatience) and their effort to get me to find an answer quickly, never mind if the answer reflects my opinion or attitude that were supposedly being looked at.
An excellent interviewer must be no less than a very good actor. Many of the demands listed here are the same as what is required of a good psychoanalyst. Yet, the interviewers are normally much less trained than actors and psychoanalysts. So, to be really good at it, the interviewer should be quite a bit beyond what's humanly possible. To mitigate our human failings, we can use technology. It is often recommended that the interview be recorded and then reviewed, to make sure the interviewer wrote down everything. It is often also recommended that the recordings be transcribed. There are different levels of using recordings:
If no recording is done and reviewed, the results reported by the interviewer depend on: Their notes, which are almost-by-definition paraphrased and not accurate; Their memory, which is incomplete and self-edited according to the interviewer’s views; Ultimately very inaccurate.
If an audio recording is done and transcribed: The transcript may be rephrased or incomplete in terms of the actual text; All voice inflections, pauses, mumbling etc. are lost, and they may have contained interesting information. The interviewer may complete these from memory, but then we are back to incomplete and edited memory.
If an audio recording is done and reviewed: All body-language information is lost. The interviewer may complete these from memory, but then we are back to incomplete and edited memory.
If a video recording is done at standard frame-rate, and reviewed: As long as the video angles are comprehensive enough to capture all the participants’ movements, many body language cues can be analyzed, which is great. Micro expressions, which are very fleeting, will still be lost.
If a high-speed video recording is done from many angles, in both visible and infra-red wavelength, and then reviewed repeatedly by a team of experts: This would be really nice, but it is beyond reasonable expectations for most studies in the next few decades.
In the context of FIRE: What can the facilitation Institute for Research in Education do to make researchers' life easier when it comes to finding and managing superheros? FIRE can consider providing, for example:
- Excellent interviewers for research that genuinely requires interviews
- Training for interviewers
- Assessment of the quality of interviewers
- Audio and video recording and transcription equipment
- Access and training in the use of tagging and analysis software for video and audio recordings
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