Russel-Research-Method-in-Anthropology

Interviewing: Unstructured and Semistructured 219
Then what happens?’’ This probe is neutral and doesn’t redirect the interview.
It shows that you understand what’s been said so far and encourages the informant
to continue with the narrative. If you use the echo probe too often,
though, you’ll hear an exasperated informant asking, ‘‘Why do you keep
repeating what I just said?’’
The Uh-huh Probe
You can encourage an informant to continue with a narrative by just making
affirmative comments, like ‘‘Uh-huh,’’ or ‘‘Yes, I see,’’ or ‘‘Right, uh-huh,’’
and so on. Matarazzo (1964) showed how powerful this neutral probe can
be. He did a series of identical, semistructured, 45-minute interviews with a
group of informants. He broke each interview into three 15-minute chunks.
During the second chunk, the interviewer was told to make affirmative noises,
like ‘‘uh-huh,’’ whenever the informant was speaking. Informant responses
during those chunks were about a third longer than during the first and third
periods.
The Tell-Me-More Probe
This may be the most common form of probe among experienced interviewers.
Respondents give you an answer, and you probe for more by saying:
‘‘Could you tell me more about that?’’ Other variations include ‘‘Why exactly
do you say that?’’ and ‘‘Why exactly do you feel that way?’’ You have to be
careful about using stock probes like these. As Converse and Schuman point
out (1974:50), if you get into a rut and repeat these probes like a robot, don’t
be surprised to hear someone finishing up a nice long discourse by saying,
‘‘Yeah, yeah, and why exactly do I feel like that?’’ (From personal experience,
I can guarantee that the mortification factor only allows this sort of thing to
happen once. The memory of the experience lasts a lifetime.)
The Long Question Probe
Another way to induce longer and more continuous responses is by making
your questions longer. Instead of asking, ‘‘How do you plant a home garden?’’
ask, ‘‘What are all the things you have to do to actually get a home garden
going?’’ When I interviewed sponge divers on Kalymnos, instead of asking
them, ‘‘What is it like to make a dive into very deep water?’’ I said, ‘‘Tell me
about diving into really deep water. What do you do to get ready and how do
you descend and ascend? What’s it like down there?’’
Later in the interview or on another occasion, I would home in on special