Interviewers

1
Interviewers

• Interviewers are critical to the collection of
  quality data.
• Invest study resources in the hiring, training,
  and supervision of interviewers.

2
Interviewer Roles

• Maximize the number of completed interviews
• Keep refusals and early terminations to a minimum
• Engage the subject in the interview
• Communicate importance of study
• Convey value of subjects participation
• Motivate respondents to participate thoughtfully
  and candidly
• Help the subject understand their role
• Administer the questionnaire
• Ask questions in unbiased manner
• Record answers correctly
• Probe incomplete responses

3
Interviewer Abilities

• Abilities capacities to perform the job
• Speak clearly and use correct grammar in the
  language of the interview
• Read in the language of the interview
• Deliver written statements and questions
  naturally
• Understand and follow written instructions
• Write in the language of the interview
• record verbatim responses accurately

4
Interviewer Abilities (cont.)

• Interpret verbal and nonverbal cues in order to
  provide reinforcement or clarification
• Regulate verbal and nonverbal behavior to avoid
  influencing responses

5
Interviewer Knowledge

• Knowledge facts and principles that
  interviewers must learn during training
• Understand the role of the interviewer
• Understand why maintaining neutrality is
  important
• Acquire sufficient information about the study to
  answer respondent questions
• NOT study hypotheses
• Principle of confidentiality and protecting
  identity of respondent

6
Interviewer Knowledge (cont.)

• How to contact and enroll respondents
• Correct procedures for asking questions
• Procedures for recording answers
• Rules for handling interpersonal aspects of the
  interview
• Administrative procedures and forms
• Study management forms
• Reimbursement forms
• Time sheets

7
Interviewer Skills

• Skills capabilities to do specific tasks,
  acquired through training and practice
• Initiate and maintain a conversation with a
  stranger
• Techniques of minimizing refusal rates
• Respond professionally to unexpected questions
  and situations
• Remain neutral by keeping personal opinions out
  of the interview process
• Motivate reluctant respondents to participate in
  the interview
• Deliver the questionnaire in a flowing,
  conversational manner
• Probe incomplete responses in an unbiased manner
  for more useful results

8
Interviewer Training

• Written materials
• Interviewers Manual
• Background information on study topic
• Lectures, presentations, discussions
• Method of administration
• Understanding the meaning of items
• Coding instructions
• Demonstration of technique
• Discussion of interviewer concerns
• Practice
• Exercises
• Role-playing
• Code a taped interview
• Practice interviews with pretend and real subjects

9
Interviewer Training (cont.)

• Conduct interviews with study subjects
• Trainer conducts, trainee also codes
• Compare and discuss recorded responses
• When trainee is coding correctly
• Trainee conducts, trainer also codes
• Compare and discuss recorded responses

10
Interviewer Training (cont.)

• Trainers
• Teach how to conduct interview
• Serve as role models
• Must instill a concern for the importance of
• Respect for ethical concerns
• Data quality
• Attention to detail
• Each part of the training should be conducted by
  the person most qualified in that area

11
Interviewer Training (cont.)

• Importance of Interviewer Training
• Dont cut corners here
• Critical to
• Response rate
• Data quality
• Allow time between training sessions
• Time for reflection
• Time to formulate questions

12
Interviewer Training (cont.)

• Pay interviewers for training
• Consider delayed payment schedule
• I.e., partial payment during training, balance of
  payment after n interviews are completed
• Training is expensive
• Be sure trainees are screeened in advance
• Plan training sessions well

13
Interviewer Training (cont.)

• Interviewers must be fully trained before they
  can conduct interviews independently
• There is no learning period in which they are
  allowed to come up to standards
• It is possible to overtrain
• Not worth the additional resources
• Can be counterproductive - create uncertainty and
  insecurity rather than raising level of
  competence and confidence

14
Interviewer Training (cont.)

• The investigator must demonstrate concern with
  the quality of all aspects of the study
• Make the interviewers feel they are part of the
  team and invested in the success of the study
• Dont expect interviewers to pay attention to
  data quality if you dont

15
Interviewer Supervision

• Maintain and improve level of performance
• Identify retraining needs
• Invest time and resources in evaluating
  interviewer performance
• Maintain morale
• Concern for interviewer safety
• Debrief after an upsetting interview
• Detect fraud or misconduct

16
Interviewer Supervision (cont.)

• Supervise interviewer performance for
• Response rate
• Monitor throughout course of study
• Most important when interviewer is new
• Early detection of decline is important
• Track rates and patterns of
• Refusals
• Early termination
• Missing data

17
Interviewer Supervision (cont.)

• Quality of interviews
• Appropriate introduction of study
• Obtaining informed consent
• Ability to establish rapport
• Asking questions as written
• Probing properly
• Clearly coded response for each item

18
Interviewer Supervision (cont.)

• Resources
• Time spent
• Productivity
• Expenses
• Mileage, phone bills

19
Interviewer Supervision (cont.)

• Interviewers may identify problems with
• Study procedures
• Data collection instruments
• Relations with study site
• Interviewers often have excellent suggestions for
  resolving problems

20
Interviewer Supervision (cont.)

• Conduct random checks with study subjects to
  determine
• Whether interview took place
• Duration of interview
• Whether all sections of interview, particularly
  long or difficult sections, were asked
• Ask subject if they remember being asked about
  particular questions, especially those that might
  be avoided by the interviewer
• Impression of interviewer
• Inform interviewers that you will be conducting
  these checks and the reason for them

21
Maintaining Staff

• Jobs can be demanding, stressful and/or tedious
• Make sure staff needs are met
• Maintain morale
• Incremental pay scale over time
• Celebrate events
• E.g., completion of particular study goals
• E.g., staff birthdays
• Flexible scheduling

22
Maintaining Staff (cont.)

• High morale results in
• Lower turnover
• Lower costs (recruiting, training)
• Higher data quality
• Let staff know you understand they are fallible
• Better for them to reveal their mistakes
• Allows you to deal with consequences
• Opportunity for retraining

23
Ethical Obligations to Study Staff

• Do not put staff in the position of being
  deceptive, misleading, or inaccurate
• Interviewers should have sufficient and accurate
  information to give subjects
• Interviewers should not be asked to misrepresent
  information about response rate or study data

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Ethical Obligations to Interviewers (cont.)

• Interviewer safety
• Dont send interviewers into an unsafe situation
• Be sensitive to racial and ethnic issues,
  particularly in context of recent events in your
  study area
• Inform interviewers explicitly that it is not a
  job requirement to go somewhere under
  circumstances that they feel are unsafe

25
Ethical Obligations to Interviewers (cont.)

• Maximize safety by
• Providing transportation or escorts
• Assigning interviewers appropriately
• Race and sex
• Time of day
• Train on ways to increase safety and reduce risk
• Hire interviewers who are indigenous to the
  neighborhood
• Have interviewers inform supervisor of dangerous
  situations or illegal behaviors

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Longitudinal Studies

• Collect information that will help locate
  subject
• Date of birth
• Social Security Number
• Expected location at follow-up
• Names and addresses of gt1 person who will know
  subjects whereabouts
• At each wave of data collection ask
• Whether contact information has changed
• Plans for relocation
• Maintain interim contact if time to next data
  collection is long and/or population is mobile
• E.g., Birthday and holiday cards with return
  postcard for corrections

27
Longitudinal Studies (cont.)

• Use Do Not Forward Address Correction
  Requested
• Re-mail card to updated address
• Use public records and other sources
• Computerized data bases
• Liaison to Income Maintenance Division
• Armed Forces Base Locator Services
• Death Records
• Provide updated consents to residential child
  welfare settings
• Develop liaisons with adult correctional system
  find central registries
• Use of agencies that track persons
• Check which data bases they use
• Check what information they need to be successful

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Data Quality

• The primary goal of study management is high
  quality data
• Ensuring high data quality should be incorporated
  into all aspects of study management
• This lecture described some features of field
  operations for achieving this goal
• Aspects of data quality that should addressed,
  but are beyond the scope of this lecture, appear
  on next slide

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Data Quality (cont.)

• Design of data collection instruments
• Selection and/or construction of measures
• Item order
• Length of interview
• Formatting of instrument
• Editing and Coding Interviews
• Levels of edits
• Interviewer - immediately after interview
• Supervisor check for completeness, appropriate
  skip patterns
• Field Coordinator
• Consensus coding
• Document coding decisions in Interviewers Manual
• Preparation of instruments for data entry
• Data entry
• Data cleaning
• Data management
• Documentation and storage of data and forms

30
Relations with Field Sites

• Form alliance with agencies and organizations
  that control access to respondents
• Convince them of value of your study
• Negotiate with them to obtain what you require
• Personnel
• Space
• Time frame

31
Relations with Field Sites (cont.)

• Determine the quality and availability of data
  for selecting sample or obtaining study measures
• Data readily available or archived
• Completeness of data
• Accuracy of data
• Recency of information
• Additional approval needed
• Parents
• other agency or branch of government
• Format of records
• Hardcopy
• Electronic
• Software needed

32
Relations with Field Sites (cont.)

• Start process early
• Can be very time-consuming
• Be sure to specify all details to avoid
  misunderstanding later on
• IRB application
• Maintain alliance with these individuals and
  organizations
• Investigator should be available to intervene
  when there is a problem
• For large study or small problem, field
  coordinator can perform some of these functions

33
Relations With Larger Community

• Decide if and how to inform the community at
  large
• Meet with influential leaders or community boards
• Media
• May want to keep a low profile in some
  communities and for some studies

34
Sources

• Stouthamer-Loeber, M., van Kammen, W. B.
  (1995). Data Collection and Management. Thousand
  Oaks, CA Sage Publications.
• Marinez, Y. N., McMahan, C. A., Barnwell, G. M.,
  Wigodsky, H. S. (1984). Ensuring data quality
  in medical research through an integrated data
  management system. Statistics in Medicine, 3,
  101-111.
• Fowler, Floyd, J., Jr. (1993). Survey Research
  Methods. Sage Publications, pages 123-131.
• Sage Survey Kit 1 chapter 4
• Sage Survey Kit 4 pages 18-24
• Sage Survey Kit 4 pages 109-146

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THE END