Qualitative researchers often explore a new topic by interviewing those directly involved, aiming to learn from their expert experience. In this entry, we’ll look at how to determine which questions help answer our exploratory question: “What is it like being a Unified sports coach?”
Our first step is to decide who is best positioned to help us answer this question. It is important to consider every person who might have relevant information or experience. In this case, because we specifically want to learn about the experiences of Unified sports coaches, we’ll start by talking directly with the coaches themselves. Students, parents and administrators may also have helpful perspectives on the experience of being a Unified coach based on their interactions with them. Since their perspectives explain or be compared to coaches’ self-perception, it may be helpful to interview them later in our project.
Next, we want to think of questions we can ask coaches that will help answer our research question. The way we ask a question will shape how the participants share their experiences. Depending on how structured the interview protocol is and how closely the researcher intends to follow it, researchers can ask a mix of interview questions to elucidate different aspects of participants’ experience (Roberts, 2023).
Orienting questions help put the participant at ease. These are the questions asked before the actual interview, which help communicate the goals for the interview and demonstrate that the researcher wants to learn from the participant. Ex: “Today we want to learn about your experience as a Unified track coach, does that sound okay?” or “Is it alright if we record today’s interview?”. Researchers can also use orienting questions to develop a rapport with the interviewer and make them feel comfortable. Ex: “How’s the school year going?”
Main questions are broad questions that allows the participant to freely talk about their experiences. Main questions outline the overarching themes of the interview, and often serve as an introduction to a topic. Ex: “Can you walk me through a typical unified sports practice?” or “Can you tell me how you encourage teamwork?”
Follow up questions are flexible questions that ask respondents to answer more in-depth. They can ask the respondents about their reactions to an experience or make connections across experiences. Follow up questions require the researcher to actively listen to determine if the respondent shared enough information about a topic. A follow up question to “Can you walk me through a typical practice?” may be, “What’s your approach to planning a practice?” or “How does your experience coaching college basketball inform your approach to coaching Unified sports?”
Probes, like follow up questions, can encourage the respondent to continue sharing details about their experiences. They can also help manage the flow of the interview by keeping the respondent on topic, asking for clarification, summarizing a response to check for understanding, and asking the respondent to share more details. Unlike follow up questions, probes can be as simple as saying, “uh-huh”, “okay”, “can you give me an example”, “that sounds…”, and “could you go back and tell me more about…”.
These types of questions help us establish an ordered approach for each topic. We start with a broad question that allows the respondent to answer freely, follow up with questions that flesh out the details, and always ask probes to ensure all the relevant details are clearly understood. We’ll use our next entry to assemble a list of all the main questions (i.e. topics) we want to ask coaches and learn how to give the interview structure and flow.
By Nathan Barrett, Research Assistant at the Center for Social Development and Education