When it comes to conducting research interviews, you’re interested in getting an understanding of your participants’ goals, perceptions, and needs.
As a facilitator, it’s easy to forget what it’s like to be a participant on the other side.
Until you are one.
Dr. Madeleine Pownall, a lecturer in Psychology at the University of Leeds recently shared her experiences as a participant of research studies in a tweet thread which I found helpful.
When I asked Dr. Pownall if she planned to publish a blog post with the tweets, she said no. And she graciously permitted me to share them in this blog post.
Learn more about Dr. Pownall on her Leeds University staff page or follow her on Twitter @maddi_pow.
Insights From a Participant to Research Facilitators
Over the past year, I’ve been a participant in different interview studies to help me get an ‘insider’ perspective on qualitative research and understand what it really feels like to be a participant.
It has been SO insightful. Some thoughts!
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Participant information sheets are way more valuable that I ever realised.
Some interviewers wanted me to do tasks in the study, others wanted me to reflect upon specific things that needed a bit of thinking about.
Having advanced warning of this to prepare is so useful.
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The opening few minutes of an interview are essential, from a participants’ point of view.
Tell me who you are, what are you hoping to get out of this, what you need from me.
The best interviews were ones that started with “so, the point of this is…” Give some context!
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Please tell participants properly how you will use their data.
For some of the more sensitive interviews, I had to ask really specific questions about the data use (who will access it? transcripts or recordings? how will you anonymise? can I trust I’ll be unidentifiable?)
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Similarly, there’s a lot to be said for a brief “If it’s okay with you, I’m going to start recording now”.
It’s easy in our don’t-forget-to-press-record researcher haste to forget this kind of etiquette, which feels really important on the other side.
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The single most effective question in any interview (for me) was: “Is there anything else you think is important for me to know, that I haven’t yet asked about?”
In some cases, this opened up a whole new discussion and felt like my voice was being centred.
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Body language is also more important that I ever realised.
There’s a lot to be said for nodding and looking engaged.
It’s easy for interviewers to have their head down making notes, which can be distracting as a participant and makes you second-guess your responses
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Finally, participating in a study means talking with a stranger, who you may never speak to again, about stuff which can get personal.
This is a big ask and can feel exposing. This all has made me realise the importance of attending to these feelings properly in our research.
Again, my thanks to Dr. Pownall for her helpful advice and for allowing me to capture her tweets in this blog post.
