2010/04/01 by Kathryn Roulston · 5 citations
Engineering · Psychology · Social Sciences · #Computer science #Data Analysis and Archiving #Diversity (politics) #Engineering #Engineering ethics #Epistemology #Interview #Perspective (graphical) #Political science #Psychology #Public relations #Qualitative Research Methods and Applications #Qualitative Research Methods and Ethics #Qualitative research #Quality (philosophy) #Sketch #Social science #Sociology #Typology
paper · doi:10.1177/1468794109356739
openalex publication_date 2010/04/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
Within the field of qualitative inquiry, there has been considerable discussion of how ‘quality’ might be demonstrated by researchers in reports of studies. With the growth in the application of qualitative methods in social research, along with the proliferation of texts available to qualitative researchers over the last four decades, there has been increasing diversity in how quality has been demonstrated in reports. In this article, I focus on the use of qualitative interviews in research studies, arguing that with a growing array of theorizations of the qualitative interview, researchers must demonstrate the quality of their work in ways that are commensurate with their assumptions about their use of interviews. I sketch a number of possibilities for how qualitative interviews might be theorized, and show the different ways in which quality might be demonstrated from each perspective. I propose this typology as one means by which novice researchers might begin to work through design decisions involved in the process of proposal writing, the conduct of interview studies, and the writing up and representation of findings.