Like your colleagues we find that instrumentation rigor and bias
management are major challenges for qualitative researchers employing
interviewing as a data generation method in their studies. Although a
usual procedure for testing the quality of an interview protocol and for
identifying potential researcher biases is the pilot study in which
investigators try out their proposed methods to see if the planned
procedures perform as envisioned by the researcher, we have found that
sometimes piloting is not practical because researchers do not want to
loose limited research participants and their valuable information to a
pilot study database not used in the study proper or the researcher does
not want to take up participants' valuable time with under-developed
questions. In such cases we find an "interviewing the interviewer"
technique can serve as a useful first step to create interview protocols
that help to generate the information proposed and to assess potential
researcher biases especially if the researcher has a strong affinity for
the participants being studied or is a member of the population itself
(e.g., nurses studying nurses). In the interviewing this interview
approach the researcher assumes the role of a study participant and
enlists a colleague to conduct the interview. The interview is recorded
and the researcher reviews the contents to see what information was
generated via the questions. The researcher can also use techniques such
as journaling or interpersonal-process recall to examine thoughts and
impressions that surfaced during the interview which might bias the
analysis of the "real" interviews of the study.
Asking for an operational definition of spirituality in an (in-depth I presume) interview study is odd. One way to address it might be to examine the role of spirituality, how it is generally conceptualized, in the transformational literature. Then make the case that there is more to be learned and what is needed is in-depth study of these women's experiences to deepen understanding of spiritual transformation and health and as you indicate, it needs to be grasped through their own understanding and consciousness. Working with a more solidified view of spirituality, like what some kind of operational definition might imply, would limit the depth of understanding needed for the study.
I do not think it necessary to have a pre-defined operationalization of the term. If it makes sense in your study, you can use their responses to have a definition emerge, but that is your call. have done research on spiritual journeys with gay and lesbian persons, and asked to use their own sense of what spirituality was for them. It worked very well. In my work, it was not important for them to give me an eloquent or cogent definition of spirituality, though I certainly got a rich sense ofhow they think of it in their lives, through indirect questioning. It worked perfectly for my purposes.
I do not think it necessary to have a pre-defined operationalization of the term. If it makes sense in your study, you can use their responses to have a definition emerge, but that is your call.
Well, yes, right, good. In the understanding of that in another means opening yourself to the other, as you know, so the inner clarity that comes with own self awareness of the phenomenon helps to open doors. What I mean is your own awareness and openness facilitates the interview process into becoming meaningful dialog where potentially a co-investigator relationship develops - both you and the interviewee becoming invested in gaining understanding, both at information and feeling levels.
