Interviewing as Qualitative Research: A Guide for Researchers in Education and the Social Sciences

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Teachers College Press, 2006 - Education - 162 pages

The Third Edition of this bestselling resource provides clear, step-by-step guidance for new and experienced interviewers to help them develop, shape, and reflect on interviewing as a qualitative research process. While proposing a phenomenological approach to in-depth interviewing, the author also includes principles and methods that can be adapted to a range of interviewing approaches. Using concrete examples of interviewing techniques to illustrate the issues under discussion, this classic text helps readers to understand the complexities of interviewing and its connections to broader issues of qualitative research.

Equally popular for individual and classroom use, the new Third Edition of Interviewing as Qualitative Researchfeatures: an introduction to the Institutional Review Board (IRB) process in its historical context, including an expanded discussion of informed consent and its complexities; apecial attention to the rights of participants in interview research as those rights interact with ethical issues; and updated references and suggestions for additional reading for a deeper consideration of methodological, ethical, and philosophical issues, including relevant Internet resources.

 

Contents

Why Interview?
7
The Purpose of Interviewing
9
The Method of A Method?
10
Why Not Interview?
12
Conclusion
14
A Structure for InDepth Phenomenological Interviewing
15
The ThreeInterview Series
16
Respect the Structure
19
6 Dissemination
72
7 Special Conditions for Children
74
The Complexities of Affirming the IRB Review Process and Informed Consent
75
Technique Isnt Everything But It Is a Lot
78
Follow Up on What the Participant Says
81
Listen More Talk Less and Ask Real Questions
84
Follow Up but Dont Interrupt
85
Two Favorite Approaches
86

Length of Interviews
20
Spacing of Interviews
21
Whose Meaning Is It? Validity and Reliability
22
Experience the Process Yourself
27
Proposing Research From Mind to Paper to Action
28
Commitment
29
From Thought to Language
30
What Is to Be Done?
31
Rationale
36
working with the Material
37
Piloting Your Work
38
Conclusion
39
Establishing Access to Making Contact with and Selecting Participants
40
Access Through Formal Gatekeepers
43
Informal Gatekeepers
45
Making Contact
46
Building a Participant Pool
48
Some Logistical Considerations
49
Selecting Participants
50
Snares to Avoid in the Selection Process
54
The Path to Institutional Review Boards and Informed Consent
57
The Establishment of Local Institutional Review Boards
58
The Informed Consent Form
60
Eight Major Parts of Informed Consent
61
1 What How Long How to What End and for Whom?
63
2 Risks Discomforts and Vulnerability
64
4 Possible Benefits
69
5 Confidentiality of Records
70
Ask Participants to Reconstruct Not to Remember
88
Do Not Take the Ebbs and Flows of Interviewing Too Personally
89
Explore Laughter
90
Follow Your Hunches
91
Tolerate Silence
92
Conclusion
93
Interviewing as a Relationship
95
Rapport
96
Social Group Identities and the Interviewing Relationship
99
Distinguish Among Private Personal and Public Experiences
106
Avoid a Therapeutic Relationship
107
Reciprocity
109
Analyzing Interpreting and Sharing Interview Material
112
What to Do Between Interviews
113
TapeRecording Interviews
114
Transcribing Interview Tapes
115
Studying Reducing and Analyzing the Text
117
Profiles and Themes
119
Making and Analyzing Thematic Connections
125
Interpreting the Material
128
Note
130
Two Profiles
133
a LongTime Day Care Provider
140
References
145
Index
156
About the Author
162
Copyright

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About the author (2006)

Irving Seidman is a professor of qualitative research and secondary teacher education at the School of Education, University of Massachusetts, Amherst.

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