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How to Choose the Right Interview Questions It is important to have the right questions for your interview. Open and closed questions fulfill different purposes, and are used under different circumstances. Closed questions require short answers and get statistic data. Open questions require longer answers get more in depth answers.

Steps

1. Before an interview it is important to decide what kind of answers you want.Open an Interview give different answers and serve different purposes. Some questions that help you find your type of interview is:
   
   
   • What is the purpose of the interview?
   • What kind of facts do you want?
   • How do you want to collect the answers, tape recorder or taking notes?
   • How do you want to present the material, in diagrams or in a textual form?
   • How much do you want the interviewed to control the interview?
   • How much control do you want to have?
   • Do you want the interviewed to explain why he or she answers the question in a specific way?
2. When you have answered these questions it is time to consider if open or closed questions best fulfill your purpose.
   
   
   • Closed questions require short answers, with one word or one phrase, for example 鈥測es锟? and 鈥渘o锟?. They give you facts, are easy to answer and the interviewer keeps control over the interview. It is easy to make statistic conclusions from closed questions; therefore a research project with closed questions requires more interviews. That gives you a random sample of reality, a statistic foundation. A good example of a research with close questions is a poll. The interviewer has all the control and asks questions that everybody can answer rather quickly. The questions are short and do not leave much room for the interviewed to reflect over the questions. Another way to do research with closed questions is through a questionnaire that is handed out to a specific amount of people. Some examples of closed question are:
     
     
     • Do you think that George W. Bush is doing a good job?
     • Do you consider yourself as a conservative or a liberal?
   • Open questions: These questions require more information from the interviewed. That means that the answers contain more than one or two word responses. Open questions help the interviewer to go deeper and analyze why things are the way they are. For example, open questions answers not only that a person does not like his or her job, but also why he or she does not like it. It gives the interviewed a chance of developing thoughts and opinions. In a research project with open questions, the researches are analyzing more deeply and go beyond the surface to find answers. This way of interviewing often requires that the interview takes place face to face. Some information does not show in the answers, but in the body language. If the interviewer wants to go beyond the surface and find out why peoples do or think the way they do it is crucial to also analyze body language. It is also a good idea to tape the interview; otherwise it is hard to recognize different tones in the interviewee鈥檚 voice, such as irony and excitement. Since the meaning is to get deep and get (sometimes) sensitive data, it is important that the interviewed is relaxed. The interview shall take place where he or she feels comfortable and no one else can hear the conversation. Some examples of open question are:
     
     
     • How do you think that George W. Bush could have done a better job?
     • What does the liberal ideology mean to you?