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official and getting introduced through him.

◆ Developing relationship: A proper rapport must be established
so that the interview can be conducted smoothly.

◆ Carrying the interview: The questions in the schedule must be
asked and the interviewer must properly add on and control
according to the situation.

◆ Recording the interview: The responses must be properly
recorded and noted.

◆ Closing the interview: The interview must be closed on a
positive note and well acknowledging the involvement of the
respondent.
Types of Interviews

The popular types of interviews are discussed below:
a. Structured directive interview
This is a formal interview where the interviewer asks questions
in a prepared schedule in the same way and in the same order
to all the respondents. This makes the recording, measuring and
analysis more accurate.
Easy comparability of one interview with the other, easy
◆ Formal and orderly coding decoding, and less time consuming are some of the merits
of structured interviews. Structured interview cuts down the scope
of natural conversation and exploration which are the greatest
demerits of the method.

b. Unstructured interviews
Unstructured interviews are characterised by a flexibility of
approach to questioning. Unstructured interviews do not follow
a predetermined set of questions or standardised techniques for
recording information. They allow the interviewer greater freedom
to ask supplementary questions, omit certain questions, or change
the sequence of questions based on the situation. The flexibility of
unstructured interviews, however, results in a lack of comparability
between interviews and makes the analysis of responses more
◆ Non-standardised difficult and time consuming compared to structured interviews.
and flexible
Unstructured interviews require deep knowledge and greater
skill on the part of the interviewer. They are commonly used in
exploratory or formulative research studies where the goal is
to gather in-depth information and insights. On the other hand,
structured interviews are often preferred in descriptive studies due
to their economy, ability to provide a basis for generalization, and
requiring less skill from the interviewer.

122 SGOU - SLM -MCom Research Methodology