03 · What You Need to Know
Understanding the Boundaries of Semi-Structured Interview Flexibility
Why Are Semi-Structured Interviews Designed to Be Flexible?
Semi-structured interviewing combines a planned direction for inquiry with opportunities to explore participants' experiences in their own terms.
The researcher usually prepares an interview guide identifying important topics, initial questions, and possible follow-up prompts. However, the interview is not intended to function as a questionnaire that must be administered word for word.
DiCicco-Bloom and Crabtree (2006) describe semi-structured interviews as commonly organized around predetermined open-ended questions, with additional questions emerging through dialogue.
This flexibility is particularly useful when participants interpret similar experiences differently or when the researcher cannot anticipate every relevant issue before data collection.
For example, teachers discussing generative AI may raise concerns about institutional policy, professional autonomy, assessment integrity, or student expectations. A rigid sequence could interrupt important explanations simply because they emerge earlier than anticipated.
Flexibility allows the interviewer to pursue relevant accounts while maintaining the study's substantive focus.
What Can Be Changed During an Interview?
Several aspects of semi-structured interviewing may be adapted without necessarily changing the underlying research design.
| Interview element |
Possible adaptation |
Methodological consideration |
| Question order |
Discuss topics when they emerge naturally |
Preserve necessary sequencing and essential coverage |
| Question wording |
Use clearer or more accessible language |
Avoid changing the substantive meaning or introducing assumptions |
| Follow-up probes |
Ask for clarification, examples, or elaboration |
Keep probes relevant and non-leading |
| Topic depth |
Explore particularly relevant experiences more extensively |
Consider whether essential topics still receive sufficient attention |
| Participant-specific questions |
Adapt prompts to roles or experiences |
Document differences affecting cross-participant interpretation |
| Emerging topics |
Investigate relevant unanticipated issues |
Assess alignment with the research purpose and approved protocol |
| Guide revisions |
Modify questions between interviews |
Record changes and assess implications for comparability and ethics |
The important distinction is between adapting the conversation and changing what the study seeks to investigate.
How Much Can You Change Question Wording?
Question wording may be adapted to improve comprehension, particularly when participants differ in professional background, language, or familiarity with technical terminology.
For example, a researcher might initially ask, "How does algorithmic decision support influence your pedagogical autonomy?"
When interviewing teachers unfamiliar with that terminology, a more accessible formulation might be, "Can you describe whether AI-generated suggestions affect the teaching decisions you make?"
The revised wording may be more understandable, although the researcher must still consider whether it captures the intended concept.
Not every rewording is harmless. Changing "How does AI affect your decisions?" to "How has AI improved your decisions?" introduces a positive assumption and changes the question's meaning.
Wording adaptations should clarify the intended inquiry without directing participants toward a preferred interpretation.
Can You Change the Order of Questions?
Yes. Question order may change when a participant spontaneously addresses a topic scheduled for later discussion.
Suppose an interview begins with questions about teaching practices, but the participant immediately explains that institutional restrictions determine which AI tools can be used.
The interviewer may explore those restrictions before returning to everyday teaching practices.
Such adjustments can preserve conversational continuity and reduce unnecessary repetition.
However, some sequences serve a methodological or ethical purpose. Introductory questions may establish context, while sensitive questions may require careful preparation.
Researchers should therefore distinguish flexible topic ordering from sequences that are necessary for comprehension, rapport, or participant welfare.
The decision about when to introduce sensitive interview questions should be informed by the research context rather than determined solely by conversational convenience.
What Makes a Follow-Up Probe Appropriate?
A probe is a question or prompt intended to clarify, deepen, or extend a participant's response.
Useful probes may ask participants to provide examples, explain the circumstances surrounding an event, clarify terminology, or describe how their interpretation developed.
For example, after a participant says, "I felt unsupported when we started using AI tools," the interviewer might ask:
- "What did support mean to you in that situation?"
- "Can you describe a particular experience that illustrates this?"
- "What happened after you raised the concern?"
- "Were there circumstances in which you felt adequately supported?"
These prompts allow the participant to elaborate without requiring agreement with a predetermined explanation.
Probing becomes problematic when it repeatedly directs participants toward the researcher's assumptions, pressures them to disclose unwanted information, or introduces topics unrelated to the approved study.
Researchers should be attentive to avoiding leading questions derived from their conceptual framework.
How Do You Know Whether an Emerging Topic Is Relevant?
Unexpected information is not automatically important merely because it is interesting.
The researcher should consider whether the emerging topic contributes to answering the research question, clarifies an important experience, challenges an existing interpretation, or reveals a previously unrecognized dimension of the phenomenon.
For example, a study examining teachers' AI adoption may unexpectedly reveal that institutional procurement policies affect access to particular tools.
If access conditions shape instructional decisions, the issue may be directly relevant and worth exploring.
By contrast, an extended discussion of unrelated administrative concerns may fall outside the study's scope.
The researcher can acknowledge the participant's account respectfully and redirect the conversation without dismissing the participant's experience.
Flexibility requires judgment about relevance, not an obligation to pursue every new topic.
Should Every Participant Still Cover the Same Core Topics?
In many semi-structured studies, shared topic coverage supports cross-participant interpretation.
However, this does not mean every participant must receive identical questions or discuss every topic to the same depth.
Some participants may have no experience of a particular event. Others may address a topic spontaneously before the interviewer reaches the corresponding question.
Researchers should identify which topics are essential for the intended analysis and distinguish them from optional areas of exploration.
The question of whether all participants should receive the same interview questions is therefore best understood as a decision about analytical requirements rather than procedural uniformity alone.
When a topic is not discussed, the researcher should consider whether it was irrelevant, deliberately omitted, or simply not explored.
Can the Interview Guide Change Between Participants?
Yes, in methodologies that permit iterative development.
Researchers may revise an interview guide after identifying ambiguous wording, inadequate probes, or emerging issues that require further examination.
Kallio and colleagues (2016) emphasize systematic guide development and testing, while DeJonckheere and Vaughn (2019) describe semi-structured interviewing as requiring a balance between relational engagement and methodological rigor.
Changes should be purposeful and documented.
For example, replacing an unclear question with a more accessible formulation may improve comprehension. Adding a new topic about institutional governance may represent a more substantial modification requiring consideration of research scope and comparability.
Researchers should retain guide versions and explain significant changes when reporting the methods.
When Does a Revision Become a Change to the Research Protocol?
Not every conversational adjustment constitutes a formal protocol amendment.
Routine clarification or probing within the approved scope may be permitted by the study's original procedures.
However, changes involving new research objectives, participant groups, sensitive questions, recording arrangements, or additional burdens may require ethics review or institutional approval.
The applicable requirements depend on the institution, jurisdiction, and approved protocol.
Researchers should verify these requirements before implementing substantial changes rather than assuming that qualitative flexibility overrides ethical obligations.
How Can Flexibility Affect Comparability?
Flexible interviews can generate rich accounts, but differences in questioning affect what information becomes available for analysis.
Suppose one group of participants is extensively questioned about institutional support while another group receives no comparable prompts.
If the first group discusses support more frequently, the difference may partly reflect the interview procedure rather than a genuine difference in experience.
Researchers should therefore distinguish between what participants volunteered, what they were invited to discuss, and what was not explored.
For qualitative comparison, identical wording may not be necessary, but the opportunities to address central analytical issues should be considered.
Field notes and interview guide records can help preserve this context.
Does Flexibility Threaten Qualitative Rigor?
Flexibility does not inherently weaken rigor. In some qualitative approaches, responsive questioning is necessary to understand participants' meanings and circumstances.
However, flexibility without methodological accountability can create problems.
An interviewer who follows only accounts that confirm the conceptual framework may produce a selective dataset. Another who allows every conversation to move into unrelated areas may fail to address the research question.
Rigor requires a defensible relationship between the research purpose, interview procedures, and analysis.
Reflexive notes can help researchers examine how their expectations and decisions shape the conversations.
Transparent documentation is particularly valuable when interview guides evolve during data collection.
How Much Flexibility Is Appropriate for Different Qualitative Methodologies?
Different methodological traditions may justify different degrees of adaptation.
A qualitative descriptive study may use relatively consistent topic coverage to support comparisons across participants.
Interpretative phenomenological research may prioritize detailed exploration of participants' lived experiences, allowing individual accounts to shape follow-up questions.
Grounded theory research may involve increasingly focused questions as developing categories inform subsequent data collection.
Ethnographic interviewing may be closely connected to ongoing observation and emerging understanding of the setting.
These descriptions are not rigid prescriptions. Researchers should follow the particular tradition they adopt and explain how the interview procedure supports its analytical commitments.
How Does Flexibility Affect Interview Sampling?
Emerging interview findings may identify experiences or participant characteristics that were not adequately represented in the initial sample.
In iterative designs, the researcher may consider recruiting additional participants who can illuminate these issues.
However, modifying questions and modifying sampling are different decisions. Both should be justified in relation to the research question and approved procedures.
The broader question of how many interviews to plan should account for the study's analytical requirements and whether iterative recruitment is anticipated.
Where saturation is methodologically appropriate, researchers should also consider whether changes in questioning influence the assessment of data saturation.
How Should Interviewers Document Adaptations?
Documentation should be proportionate to the significance of the change.
Routine follow-up probes may be evident in recordings or transcripts. More substantial changes should be recorded explicitly.
Researchers may maintain an interview log containing the guide version, participant category, important omitted topics, emerging issues, and reasons for major deviations.
When multiple interviewers are involved, regular discussions can help maintain a shared understanding of the study's core topics and acceptable flexibility.
Documentation should not become so burdensome that it interferes with attentive interviewing. Its purpose is to support transparent analysis and methodological accountability.
