Data Collection Methodologies Focus Group and Interview Free Essay Example, 1000 words

To understand the meanings and the reasons which an interviewee associate certain way of behaviour, allowing to understand, why a particular habit or behaviour is exhibited, which in ordinary life is not possible to understand. John (1985) argues that interview is special mode of interaction and understanding people s knowledge, norms, and cultural values in an impartial way giving an understanding, how people make sense of their culture, religion and social behaviour. In plain words, interview allows to reach inside people s head rather than keep on guessing, what means what. Semi-structured or unstructured interviews (informal interview) are useful when researchers want in-depth understanding of a topic. It is easy to interview people than to develop a written survey and capture all the possible variations. In informal interview, normally its trust between the researcher and the interviewer and is less stressful as the interviewer does not feel himself in a stressed situation and the communication takes place in a friendly atmosphere. The development of trust allows the researcher to explore beyond the personal ego allowing the researcher to satisfy his curiosity and explore the understudy question in depth without any obstacle. Structured in-person interviews can be useful when participants have difficulty with a written survey or when a researcher wants to clarify (qualitative) questions in addition to structured questions. We will write a custom essay sample on Data Collection Methodologies: Focus Group and Interview or any topic specifically for you Only $17.96 $11.86/page The interviewers ordinarily require less training and instruction compared to other methodsGarvey (1998) has mentioned that observational research method provides understanding of interaction between marketers and users, exploring members interaction in an organisation and understanding norms in a community.