E-Interview Research Framework

The E-Interview Research Framework includes eight interrelated categories of key questions that can help a researcher think through the design of  a study that uses data collected with online interviews.

The categories are:

1. Aligning Purpose and Design, including questions about alignment of theory, epistemology, methodology and the online data collection methods.
2. Choosing E-Interviews for the Study, including questions about the rationale for and purpose of the online interviews (and/or observations or online documents.)
3. Handling Sampling and Recruiting, including questions about whether proposed sampling and recruiting approaches are appropriate and ethical.
4. Positioning the Researcher, including questions about the extent to which the researcher is an insider or an outsider vis a vis the research phenomena and context.
5. Determining E-Interview Style(s), including questions about level of structure and alignment with types of online communication(s) to be used for data collection.
6. Selecting ICT & Milieu including questions about types of online communication(s) to be used for data collection and the setting for the interviews (or observations.)
7. Conducting the Interview including questions about the researcher’s ability to carry out an interview using the selected technology and setting.
8. Addressing Ethical Issues including questions about ways to protect human subjects, and where appropriate, their avatars or online identities, and ways to protect the data.

The E-Interview Research Framework is displayed as a circle to convey the importance of a systems-thinking approach and to reinforce the point that answers to one question have implications for the other aspects of research design, conduct and analysis. Learn more about the Framework in this short recorded overview. In the free sample materials you can download Chapter 1, then read Cases in Online Interview Research to see how it is used to analyze ten multi-disciplinary cases.