Unstructured Interview - Examples in Sociology

Examples in Sociology

Aaron Cicourel and John Kitsuse used the method in 1963 for their interviews. It enabled them to ask further questions beyond what they already had planned, in addition, it enabled them to clarify meaning of the responses they received. There are both advantages and disadvantages of unstructured interviews. The advantages are that the data collected is said to be valid as it is an exact account of what the interviewee has said. The researcher can also find out important information which did not seem relevant before the interview and ask the interviewee to go further into the new topic. Unstructured interviews are also more suitable for sensitive subjects such as "domestic violence" as many people would lie in a more formal interview and also their response may not be on the preset question list. The disadvantages of interviews in general is the "interviewer effect". This is when the interviewee response is affected by the presence of the researcher due to either his/her race, ethnicity, colour, or response to certain answers. Unstructured interviews can also be very time consuming as the conversation can go on and on. The data collected is prone to digression and much of the data collected could be worthless. The data is also not reliable as it can not be done again with the same results due to a number of factors. Unstructured interviews are usually small scale so it is hard to generalise with the results as only a small number of the population can be interviewed. Also Data collection is hard to categorise as there is likely to be a variety of different answers. Coding will require more work when choosing categories for the respondents.

Social surveys
Gathering data
  • Collection methods
  • Census
  • Sampling for surveys
  • Random sampling
  • Questionnaire
  • Interview
    • Structured
    • Semi-structured
    • Unstructured
Analyzing data
  • Categorical data
  • Contingency table
  • Level of measurement
  • Descriptive statistics
  • Exploratory data analysis
  • Multivariate statistics
  • Psychometrics
  • Statistical inference
  • Statistical models
    • Graphical
    • Log-linear
    • Structural
Applications
  • Market research
  • Opinion poll
Major surveys
  • National Election Studies
  • Gallup poll
  • General Social Survey
  • International Social Survey
  • United Kingdom Census
  • United States Census
  • National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey
  • New Zealand Attitudes and Values Study
  • World Values Survey
Professional
associations
  • International Statistical Institute
  • World Association for Public Opinion Research
  • American Association for Public Opinion Research
  • European Society for Opinion and Marketing Research
  • Category
  • Projects
    • Business
    • Politics
    • Psychology
    • Sociology
    • Statistics


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