Talal - you can't use structured (closed-ended i.e. yes/no/don't know) questions/interview guides for qualitative research. They are mostly the domain of quantitative survey design. Unstructured and semi-structured interview guides can both be used for qualitative approaches.

If by "semi-structured," you mean not all questions are open-ended, that's the one. To provide a context for analysis, nearly always you are going to have some questions that are more structured, e.g. beliefs/behaviors/demography that you can't integrate from another source.

Of course, do not ask questions that you could or should already have the answers to; that's a waste of everyone's time.

Dear Talal Abdalla

Some of the things that need to be considered include the research questions/objectives and the theoretical framework underpinning the research.

You might find the discussion on this thread helpful https://www.researchgate.net/post/What_is_the_difference_between_a_structured_and_a_semi-structured_questionnaire

Talal - you can't use structured (closed-ended i.e. yes/no/don't know) questions/interview guides for qualitative research. They are mostly the domain of quantitative survey design. Unstructured and semi-structured interview guides can both be used for qualitative approaches.

Dear Tala,

You can't use a structured interview (yes no ended questions) in the qualitative studies

Semi-Structured is unfortunately a rather vague term in qualitative research. I personally think it means that you do have a series of open-ended questions written in advance, but you can also adapt those questions to what is happening in any particular interview.

Laurie Gelb

Nyawira Mwangi

Dean Whitehead

Aladeen Alloubani

David L Morgan

thanks alot for your helpful advice

that means in a semi-structured interview can add new questions during the interview

I think the question whether you can add a completely new topic to a set-structured interview is pushing the limits. If you do that, I would introduce it as late in the interview as possible, so that earlier portion would still be compare to your other interviews.

Dear Talk, it will mostly depend on your research objectives... Please

Thanks.

David L Morgan

Thank you for your valuable response and advice. how about case study research (five business ) based on semi-structured interviews, any advice or suggestion related to my first question will be helpful.

Dear Talal,

I think the semi-structured interview is better. Because you have the possibility to go deeper into the issues during the interview and ask more detailed questions. Also, the semi-structured interview helps to increase the validity of the research. Especially when the snowball sampling method is used.

My favorite source on comparative case studies is R. Yin, "Case Study Research.

In response to your second question; case study research (five business ):

Questions about analyzing the business environment (external and internal environment), or in general, the SWOT Matrix / Porter's five forces analysis, can be a good start. Further, during interviews, you can ask more and deeper questions about these issues.

In qualitative inquiry, the type of data collection tool is guided by research design and research questions researcher/s want to answer. Once researcher has narrowed down to interview as a method of data collection, one need to choose appropriate approach from unstructured, semi-structured or in-depth interview.

A structured interview is avoided in qualitative inquiry as it more quantitative research method commonly employed in survey research. Structured interview gives limited scope for qualitative data.

Unstructured interview: It is a relatively structureless interview style that researchers use to establish rapport and comfort with the participant. It is extremely helpful when researchers are discussing sensitive topics. There are few questions that researcher probe during conversation to obtain the most rich and in-depth information possible. It is more of free conservation with research participant in and around research area.

Semi-structured interview: This interview type has some pre-defined questions as well as provide scope to probe additional details related to research questions. Semi-structured interview is facilitated using interview protocol which help guide the researcher through the interview process. It is more of guided conservation with research participants with focus on research under study.

In-depth interview: It allows in-depth examination of issues using combination of semi-structured and unstructured interview. Here research participant is equally engaged in conversation. In-depth interview is intensive conversation with research participants often require multiple rounds of interview sessions. This tool is used in grounded theory research, ethnographic research and phenomenological research.

Hope you can now decide the most appropriate tool for your qualitative research.

Best Wishes,

Apurva

The following publications may further help, particularly: the main characteristics of unstructured and semi-structured interviewing; the differences between structured interviews, unstructured interviews, and semi-structured interviews; issues to consider for a qualitative interview, etc. (See: Bryman, 2012, pp. 470-499; Qu and Dumay, 2011, pp. 244-247).

• Alshenqeeti, H. (2014) Interviewing as a Data Collection Method: A Critical Review, English Linguistics Research, 3, 1, pp. 39-45.
• Bryman, A. (2012) Social Research Methods. 4th edn. New York: Oxford University Press Inc.
• Edwards, R. and Holland, J. (2013) What is qualitative interviewing? London: Bloomsbury Academic.
• Qu, S. Q. and Dumay, J. (2011) The qualitative research interview, Qualitative Research in Accounting and Management, 8, 3, pp. 238-264.
• Whiting, L. S. (2008) Semi-structured interviews: guidance for novice researchers, Nursing Standard, 22, 23, pp. 35-40.

I agree that semi-structured interviews is the best option of the two. I also agree with professor Morgan that adding questions during the interview is not a very good idea. However you may of course ask the informants to clarify their answer or ask them to develop their answer, that is to ask probing questions based on their given answers.

Åsa Rejnö , Kenneth Lui-ming Ngie , Apurva Kumar Pandya , Emadoddin Ghazi ,

Thanks for your ideas

If you are collecting qualitative data, the option is semi structured interviews

Me too think that semi structured interview protocol would be more effective. In addition, if you are interested you would probably refer McAdams "Biographical Interview protocol".

Semi-structured Interviews

Many researchers like to use semi-structured interviews because questions can be prepared ahead of time.  This allows the interviewer to be prepared and appear competent during the interview. 

Semi-structured interviews also allow informants the freedom to express their views in their own terms. 

Semi-structure interviews can provide reliable, comparable qualitative data.

thanks for your response

Salameh A. Mjlae , Samitha Udayanga

You could explore structured questionnaires . The only catch is that it has to be done pretty well

I'd recommend reading this:

Bernard, H. R. 2002. Interviewing: Unstructured and Semistructured. In Research Methods in Anthropology. Qualitative and Quantitative Approaches. Altamira. Pp. 203-230

If you can't access it, please let me know

I personally support with the statement given by Dean Whitehead. In terms of a qualitative research, structured questionnaire may not work properly. However, it's better to adopt either semi structured or unstructured questionnaire for qualitative nature of research.

Thanks

Semi-structured interview is more suitable in qualitative researches. However, I prefer using unstructured interview for qualitative researches. This is because it offers greater degree of flexibility and more conducive environment for the informants/collaborators by which a researcher can generate richer data.

It is very simple.The quantitative research is close ended as they have to be measured in numbers or with a scale.But a qualitative research is exploratory and is open ended and we want to find a new variable from the sample,thus it will be only open ended.

Dear Talal Abdalla ,

I echo what most colleagues have suggested. You can use semi-structured, unstructured interview techniques for conducting individual interview or conduct focus group interviews based on your research questions and research design. Ultimately research tool should gather information that are necessary to address research problem under study.

For more clarity, you can read following books:

All the best,

Apurva

Both unstructured and semi-structured interview guides can be used for qualitative nature

semi structured interview would probably provides more in depth answer to your question because it gives freedom to the subject to express everything openly without rigorous restriction

Thank you all for your valuable suggestions and answers.

See

Government Accountability Office (GAO) Using Structured Interviewing Techniques, GAO/PEMD-10.1.5, Government Accounting Office, Washington, D.C., June 1991, 191pp.