What’s the Use of Qualitative Interviews

Bibliographic Data

ID21644028
AuthorsK Roulston (0000-0002-9429-2694, University of Georgia, corresponding author)
Year2026
Publication date2026-07-06
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueQualitative Inquiry (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1077-8004 • E-ISSN: 1552-7565
PublisherSAGE Publications (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/10778004261459684
OpenAlexW7167476770
LanguageEN
References cited31

Humans have been asking questions of one another to gain information for centuries. Until recently, the interviewee and interviewer roles were occupied by humans. With the advent of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI), human interviewers can now be replaced by artificial intelligence avatars who as autonomous agents can modify their questions and respond to human participants, while Large Language Models can simulate human participants in response to interviewers’ questions. This article reviews the history of interviewing before examining the roles played by GenAI in qualitative interview research. A case is made for retaining human interviewers and interviewees in qualitative interview research

Generative grammar · Human intelligence · Human science · Interview · Qualitative research · Semi-structured interview · Focus Groups and Qualitative Methods · Qualitative Research Methods and Applications · Qualitative Research Methods and Ethics