Interviews

• Interviews allow you interact with the respondent.

• You can have more contingency questions and a more complex survey in general.

• Because of the added complexity, you can get more specific information from each respondent.

• Both face to face and telephone interviews offer these advantages, however there are differences between the two.

Face to face:

Advantages:

• A personal bond is established.
• Surveys can last much longer.
• Can get to hidden populations

Disadvantages:

• You are limited to local respondents
• You have a lower sample size
• Respondents have no anonymity
• Travel time and the length of interviews can add up.

Telephone:

Advantages:

• Maintains the possibility of anonymity
• You can have bigger samples
• Cheaper to administer
• Possibility of random digit dialing

Disadvantages:

• Respondents still have the opportunity to hang up.
• Many unlisted numbers
• Random digit dialing produces many business and disconnected numbers