Who says you have to get your research from books, articles, and the web? Another source for research is one you might not have considered: the original interview.

One thing you can bank on with this source: no one else will have it!

Interviews give you an opportunity to create original research. Say, for example, you’re writing an article on the Virginia Tech duck pond. Who could you talk to about it?

To find out whether any studies have been conducted on the pollution levels or the processes that might regenerate the pond, you could talk to VT faculty members in the sciences (or even engineering!).
To find out what the pond means to VT as a community, you could talk to alumni, current students, and Blacksburg residents. What these sources tell you can then find a place in your article.

Although the best method for conducting an interview is to sit down with your subject — someone who knows a good deal about or can address effectively the topic about which you’re writing — today many interviews are conducted by email.

While email interviews are quick and efficient for you, the face-to-face interview is more reader-friendly because it puts the responsibility of taking notes on you; all your subject needs to do is respond to your questions. However, if you’re worried about accuracy in recording, the email interview dispels that issue because you’ll have the responses already written for you by the subject. Hmmm…..reader-friendliness vs. accuracy? Which wins? Your best bet is to ask your subject: Would you prefer a face-to-face interview or an email interview?

Basic tips on how to conduct a successful face-to-face interview are shown in the next section, but even after reading the information in the table, you still might have questions about what sorts of questions you should ask. Let’s consider that you are a member of a group analyzing the career preparedness of your peers, and you have been charged with interviewing someone who is set to graduate this semester. What sorts of questions could you ask him or her? And then what if you had to talk to someone in Career Services about the same topic. What would you ask?

Tips for Conducting an Interview

Conduct preliminary research to determine the best subjects for your interview.
Make preliminary contact with your subjects, during which you should explain fully the goal of your work and ask permission for an interview.
Once you have made an appointment with your subjects, keep it and be on time!
Prepare a list of questions. Ensure that their meaning is clear!
Be prepared to take notes or record the interview. However, before you arrive equipped with a recorder and nothing else, ask the subject whether recording is acceptable.
If you take notes, save time at the end of the interview to verify their accuracy, particularly with regard to direct quotations.
Offer to send the subject(s) a copy of your final product.

Creating Questions

How do you know what to ask your interview subject? Begin with what are called the Reporter’s Questions: Who? What? Why? Where? When? and How?

Although these are actually just words, rather than entire questions, they should form the basis of your actual questions.

You should think about what you want to discover and formulate questions based upon that awareness. For example, if you want to gather quotations that you can use in your document, you should make sure to ask open-ended questions, ones that prompt a longer, developed response, something other than yes or no.

Realize that if you ask a series of questions that can be answered by yes or no (called closed-ended questions), you will get no real quotations that you can use. Also, be prepared to think on the fly. If your interview subject starts talking about something that interests you and might prove useful to the project, prompt him or her to continue by asking additional questions not on your list. So keep these things in mind:

Create your questions based on what you want to discover from this person.
Ask “open-ended” questions as well as “closed-ended” (yes or no) ones.
Be prepared to add questions as the interview progresses.
Pay attention!!!

Interviewing is not easy, but if you sit down with your subject with a list of prepared and useful questions, then you are at least headed in the right direction.