Interaction before and during the survey interview: insights from conversation analysis
Year: 2020
Type: article
Abstract: Conversation analysts have described the formation of actions and the sequential organization of talk in a wide variety of contexts and offer resources that can be used to study interaction in the interview. Conversational practices are relevant before and during the survey interview: First, the process of recruiting sample members to become respondents provides a site in which an analysis of actions can be applied with a measurable outcome - the effects on participation. Second, once the interview and the task of measurement begins, conversational practices intersect with - and sometimes disrupt -- the "paradigmatic" question-answer sequence, complicating our notions of what it means to "measure" a construct in interaction. CA provides insights into interaction at both these tasks. This paper selectively reviews work that uses conversation analysis to understand the survey interview and offers some new applications (e.g., examining answers to yes-no questions).
Author: Nora Cate Schaeffer
Institution: University of Wisconsin–Madison
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W3089946994