Exploring the Definition and Dynamics of Interviews in Research

Every day, we talk to people – friends, colleagues, family. But not every conversation is an interview. In research, the word “interview” carries a very specific meaning, and understanding that meaning is foundational to understanding how psychologists and social scientists gather data. At its core, a research interview is a purposeful, structured verbal exchange between two parties – an interviewer and a respondent – aimed at collecting information on a defined topic. It sounds simple, but the dynamics at play are far more deliberate and nuanced than any ordinary chat.

How scholars define the interview 🔗

Across the psychological literature, several key definitions have shaped how we understand interviews as a research tool. According to Kerlinger, the interview is a “face-to-face interpersonal role situation” in which the interviewer poses questions designed to obtain answers relevant to a research problem. Dezen described it simply as any face-to-face conversational exchange where one person elicits information from another. Good and Hatt framed it more broadly as a process of social interaction between two people. Perhaps most authoritatively, the American Psychological Association (APA) defines the interview as a directed conversation in which a researcher, therapist, clinician, or employer intends to elicit specific information from an individual.

What ties all these definitions together is intentionality. The interview is never accidental or spontaneous – it is always goal-directed. As EBSCO’s Research Starters on interviewing in psychology notes, the interviewer accepts responsibility for keeping the exchange on track and moving toward a defined goal – a function that sets the interviewer apart from any typical conversation partner.

Interview vs. casual conversation: a critical distinction 🔗

One of the most important conceptual lines to draw is between an interview and an ordinary conversation. They may look similar on the surface – two people talking – but they operate under fundamentally different rules.

In a casual conversation, there is usually no central theme, roles are fluid and undefined, and the exchange starts and ends whenever the participants feel like it. People share stories, repeat themselves, go off on tangents, and generally follow no particular agenda. An interview, by contrast, is scheduled in advance, follows a defined structure, and maintains clear asymmetry in roles – one person asks, the other responds. As Simply Psychology explains, interviews have distinct features compared to ordinary conversation, including being scheduled in advance, having an asymmetry in outcome goals between the interviewer and the interviewee, and often following a question-answer format.

This distinction is well captured by the phrase researchers often use: interviews are “conversations with a purpose.” The phrase was popularized by Robert Burgess during his ethnographic work in the 1970s and has since become a foundational concept in qualitative research methodology. The purpose is always pre-determined, the direction is always controlled, and the outcome is always aimed at generating usable data.

As researcher Scott Matter articulates, an interview is a mode of communication where the purpose is to collect information from one or more people in order to understand their experience, thinking, and the principles that shape their behavior – something a casual conversation simply cannot reliably deliver.

The core features that define an interview 🔗

Understanding what makes an interview an interview requires looking at its defining characteristics. These are not incidental – they are what give the interview its methodological integrity.

Defined roles 🔗

In every research interview, there are two clearly distinct roles. The interviewer facilitates the process – asking questions, guiding the discussion, and keeping focus on the research topic. The interviewee (also called the respondent) provides the information. These roles do not switch back and forth the way they naturally might in a conversation. The interviewer’s job is to listen, probe, and guide – not to share personal opinions or experiences. This role discipline is essential for maintaining data integrity, because, as research methodology experts emphasize, an interviewer who inserts themselves into the interaction risks undermining the reliability of the data.

Purpose and structure 🔗

Every interview is built around a research objective. Questions are crafted deliberately to extract meaningful data on a specific topic. Even the most open-ended, free-flowing interview format retains an underlying purpose that guides the interviewer’s approach. Research methods scholars note that a qualitative interview is not a casual conversation – unlike casual exchanges, research interviews have an established purpose, involve more systematic questioning from the interviewer, and yield far more detailed and deliberate responses from the interviewee.

Pre-arranged timing and setting 🔗

Unlike a spontaneous chat, research interviews are formally scheduled. They take place at a predetermined time and location – a factor that signals to both parties that the exchange has an official character. This pre-arrangement also ensures that the interviewee has had time to prepare, and that the interviewer has their materials and questions ready. EBSCO’s psychological research database points out that one distinguishing feature of interviews is that they begin and end at pre-established times, unlike ordinary conversations which flow entirely at participants’ discretion.

Social interaction and rapport 🔗

Although interviews are formal, they are not cold or robotic. Unlike surveys or questionnaires, interviews involve genuine social interaction between two people. This means the interviewer’s behavior – their tone, demeanor, body language, and perceived status – can all influence the quality of the responses they receive. This is known as the interviewer effect, and it’s a key reason why researchers require proper training before conducting interviews. Factors like gender, age, ethnicity, and social standing of the interviewer can subtly shape how a respondent answers, particularly on sensitive topics. Building rapport – a sense of trust and mutual understanding – is therefore an essential part of effective interviewing.

What kinds of data does an interview produce? 🔗

Interviews are primarily a tool for gathering qualitative data – rich, descriptive information about people’s thoughts, feelings, experiences, and perceptions. This is data that quantitative methods like surveys struggle to capture. When a researcher asks a respondent to explain why they felt a certain way, or to describe what happened in their own words, the result is nuanced insight that numbers alone cannot provide.

Responses are typically recorded – either via audio or written notes – and later transcribed into a written account that can be analyzed using methods like thematic analysis or content analysis. Research published in peer-reviewed psychological literature consistently affirms that interviewing is considered a key form of qualitative inquiry that yields rich data on lived experience and the meaning people make of life events.

That said, interviews can also produce quantitative data when structured formats with closed-ended questions are used – though this is less common and serves a different research purpose.

The spectrum of interview types 🔗

Interviews in research are not one-size-fits-all. They exist on a spectrum of structure, ranging from highly formal to almost conversational.

Structured interviews 🔗

These follow a fixed set of predetermined questions, asked in the same order to every participant. There is no deviation from the interview schedule, making this format highly consistent and easy to replicate. As Scribbr’s methodology guide explains, structured interviews are predominantly a quantitative tool, relying on closed-ended questions that generate comparable, analyzable data across a large sample. The trade-off is limited depth – fixed questions leave little room for the respondent to elaborate or take the discussion in a new direction.

Semi-structured interviews 🔗

This is the most commonly used format in psychological research. The interviewer has a prepared set of questions or topics but retains the flexibility to ask follow-up questions, probe for deeper answers, and adjust the sequence based on how the conversation unfolds. This balance between structure and flexibility makes it ideal for exploring complex psychological phenomena without losing methodological rigor.

Unstructured interviews 🔗

Sometimes called in-depth interviews or discovery interviews, these have no fixed question list. The researcher enters the conversation with a broad topic in mind and allows the discussion to develop organically. QuestionPro’s research methodology resources describe unstructured interviews as conversations held with a purpose – they resemble natural dialogue but are anchored by a research objective and rely on the researcher’s skill to keep the discussion on track.

Why the interview matters in psychological research 🔗

The interview method is used across a wide range of psychological subfields – clinical psychology, social psychology, developmental psychology, educational psychology, and more. In clinical settings, clinical interviews serve as the most widely used method of preliminary assessment, providing essential context for diagnosis and treatment. Clinicians conduct intake interviews to understand a client’s immediate concerns, diagnostic interviews to assess whether specific criteria are met, and even termination interviews to help clients process the close of their therapeutic relationship.

In research settings, the interview allows investigators to access information that no other method can easily reach – the subjective inner world of the participant. Attitudes, memories, beliefs, motivations, and emotional responses are all territory that the interview is uniquely positioned to explore. That said, interviews are not without limitations. They can be time-consuming and costly to conduct and analyze. Social desirability bias – where respondents give answers they think are expected rather than truthful – is a real concern. And because the interview is a social event, the dynamics between interviewer and respondent always have the potential to influence the data.

Despite these challenges, the interview remains one of the most powerful and flexible instruments in a researcher’s toolkit – precisely because it treats participants as thinking, feeling human beings rather than data points.

What do you think? When you consider how much of our self-understanding is shaped by the stories we tell, do you think interview-based research can ever truly capture an objective picture of human behavior? And how might the relationship between interviewer and respondent shape the kind of truth that emerges in a research interview?

References

1. https://dictionary.apa.org/interview
2. https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/health-and-medicine/interviewing-psychology
3. https://www.simplypsychology.org/interviews.html
4. https://medium.com/@scott.matter/interviews-are-not-conversations-3c9dafa427ef
5. https://openbooks.macewan.ca/researchmethods/chapter/chapter-9-qualitative-interviewing/
6. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8172075/
7. https://www.scribbr.com/methodology/interviews-research/
8. https://www.questionpro.com/blog/types-of-interviews/