1. Interviewing Techniques
Dr. Neil Schwartz
Psych 560
Interviewing Techniques

2. The Interview as Test
It is a data gathering method to describe and predict a person’s behavior.
It must be purposeful, responsible, and goal directed.
It is reciprocal in nature– both interviewer and interviewee affect the behavior of the other.
It can be conceived as social facilitation to gather qualitative data.

3. The Interview as Attitude
Effective interviewing skills are based on:
Warmth
Genuineness
Acceptance
Understanding
Openness
Honesty
Fairness

4. Effective vs. Ineffective Responses
Be centered, mindful & attentive.
Use open-ended questions.
Be flexible.
Avoid judgment or evaluative statements.
Avoid probing statements.
Keep personal attitudes and emotions in check.

5. Responding for Flow Transitional Phrases Verbatim Playback
Paraphrasing and Restatement
Summarizing
Clarification
Empathy and Understanding

6. Types of Interview: Evaluation
Based on the idea that accurate understanding leads to self-exploration.
It makes use of open-ended questions from which to understand the interviewee.
It makes use of confrontation, but principally in the context of the therapeutic interview.

7. Types of Interviews: Structured Clinical
They provide a specific set of questions pin a particular order.
They make use of standardized rules for probing responses.
They are used along with specific scoring procedures that are typically norm referenced.
The DSM IV is used with a structured interview.

8. Types of Interviews: Case History
The purpose of CH interviews are to understand a person’s background.
They may are highly structured.
They are extremely high in reliability.
They yield little to no self-awareness or therapeutic effect.

9. Interviewing: Validity
Interviews are prone to the Halo Effect.
The tendency to judge traits on the basis of a general impression.
Interview are effected by salient characteristics.
Interviews are effected by cultural biases and misunderstandings.
They should be regarded as yielding tentative hypotheses.

10. Interviewing: Reliability
The best estimate of interview reliability is based on inter- interviewer reliability.
Structured interviews are significantly more reliability than unstructured ones.
Reliability is enhanced when interviewers are trained to evaluate highly specific dimensions.