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The Focused Interview
Abstract
The focused interview is designed to determine the responses of persons exposed to a situation previously analyzed by the investigator. Its chief functions are to discover: (1) the significant aspects of the total situation to which response has occurred; (2) discrepancies between anticipated and actual effects; (3) responses of deviant subgroups in the population; and (4) the processes involved in experimentally induced effects. Procedures for satisfying the criteria of specificity, range, and depth in the interview are described.
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Citations
Cited by
O.Nyumba, T., Wilson, K., Derrick, C. J., & Mukherjee, N. (2018) · Methods in Ecology and Evolution · doi:10.1111/2041-210x.12860 · Cited by 2,619
“Sociologists and psychologists have used the method since the 1940s (e.g. Merton & Kendall, 1946; Merton, Fiske & Kendall 1956).”
MethodMorgan, D. L. (1996) · Annual Review of Sociology · doi:10.1146/annurev.soc.22.1.129 · Cited by 2,353
Overview of Focus Group Research
Asbury, J.-E. (1995) · Qualitative Health Research · doi:10.1177/104973239500500402 · Cited by 399
Early Intervention Practices for Children With Autism: Descriptions From Community Providers
Stahmer, A. C., Collings, N. M., & Palinkas, L. A. (2005) · Focus on Autism and Other Developmental Disabilities · doi:10.1177/10883576050200020301 · Cited by 296
The Devil's Advocate: A Strategy to Avoid Groupthink and Stimulate Discussion in Focus Groups
MacDougall, C., & Baum, F. (1997) · Qualitative Health Research · doi:10.1177/104973239700700407 · Cited by 141
Metadata
- Authors
- Merton, R. K., & Kendall, P. L.
- Venue
- American Journal of Sociology
- Publisher
- University of Chicago Press
- Published
- 1946-05
- Volume
- 51
- Issue
- 6
- Pages
- 541-557
- ISSN
- 0002-9602 (ISSN-L)
- 1537-5390
- OpenAlex
- W2052327508
- Cited by
- 1,211
- References
- 0
- FWCI
- 31.23
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
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- Merton, R. K., & Kendall, P. L. (1946). The Focused Interview. American Journal of Sociology. https://doi.org/10.1086/219886
Data sources
Bibliographic data: Semantic Scholar, OpenAlex, Crossref.
Contains information from the Semantic Scholar Academic Graph Datasets, made available under the ODC Attribution License (ODC-BY 1.0).
Semantic Scholar’s data is described in: Kinney, R., et al. (2023). The Semantic Scholar Open Data Platform. arXiv:2301.10140.
