Qualitative Research Interviewing
Biographic Narrative and Semi-Structured Methods
- Tom Wengraf - Middlesex University, UK
Qualitative Research Interviewing is unique in its conceptual coherence and the level of practical detail that it offers to the beginning social researcher. It provides a comprehensive resource for those concerned with the practice of semi-structured interviewing, the most commonly used interview approach in social research, and in particular for depth, biographic narrative interviewing, the interview methods of choice in qualitative research. It covers the full range of practices from the identification of topics through to strategies for writing up research findings in diverse ways.
The first part describes a coherent conceptual framework for understanding semi-structured and biographic narrative interviewing. It uses examples of good and bad practice from both published research and work by students and field researchers to clarify the following issues:
- The purpose of research
- The development of research questions
- The initial design of interview questions for differently-constructed interview sessions, including follow-up questions
- Generating narrative questions and note-taking
- Choices of random or theory-driven 'samples' of informants
- Managing contact during, and after interviews.
The second part deals with data analysis and writing up. The philosophy and politics of transcribing, coding and interpretation are dealt with in a highly practical way and the complex procedure of biographic-narrative interpretation -distinguishing lived life from told story - is described and illustrated in an accessible way.
The final sections deal with theorising and the writing up of a range of interview reports using a variety of textual strategies. Examples of good and bad practice from student and published research are included throughout.
Qualitative Research Interviewing is a unique and indispensable resource for learning the art and craft of a wide spectrum of methods and approaches in interview based research.
In-depth study of qualitative research interviewing with advice beyond the BNIM method. There is a wealth of guidance offered that stems from real research experience.
A practical and useful text from designing biographic narrative research projects, to interviewing and analysing data. Good examples to support a greater understanding of the method.
This offers very useful material for thinking through the process of doing interviews in qualitative research.
Very Good book for anybody looking to perform Interviews
Our Program has chosen instead to focus our training of students on quantitative methods.
Excellent practical and comprehensive book on in-depth semi structured interviewing.
I believe this text is the strongest on interviews I have read. It is ideal for PhD students as well as masters students. It is very practical and thorough and covers all aspects of the process. Any student considering qualitative research and more specifically questionnaires really need to use this text
Excellent and detailed guidance on how to prepare for the biographical interview.
The purposes of ‘qualitative research interviewing’ are to introduce the reader to different approaches and frameworks for conducting structured and semi-structured interviews. This text is a fully comprehensive resource which discusses different conceptual frameworks available for analysing and making sense of interview transcripts. Examples of conceptual frameworks and guidelines are provided for conducting evaluations of transcripts and theoretical inferences from the data to build hypothesis or general models of typologies.
This text is recommended for researchers who seek to design research questions suitable for conducting in-depth interviews and make inferences from the data gathered. The level of the book is accessible to postgraduate and doctoral students as well as anyone working as part of a research team.
Great book for interview based research. great depth in semi-structured interviewing
