Interview
An interview is a conversation led by the evaluator with the intent of gathering data. Interviews can differ in terms of:
participants
Individual: one participant at a time
Focus group: more than one participant at a time
planning
Formal: the interview was pre-arranged
Informal: the interview was unplanned, perhaps happening unexpectedly in the field
preparation
Structured: strictly defined questioning protocol, no deviations from the set questions
Semi-structured: questions or topics to discuss are prepared in advance, but the conversation can flow to new topics
Unstructured: the interviewer has no specific questions prepared
questions
Open-ended: respondents answer in their own words
Close-ended: respondents are limited to pre-defined choices
Note: interviews may not always fit neatly into these categories - they give an idea of the ways interviews can be conducted, but are not hard rules.
See also: qualitative data, qualitative data analysis