Repeat receipts: a device for generating visible data in market research focus groups

Abstract

Market research focus groups generate three types of data: first, representatives of commissioning companies or organizations watch the group from behind a one-way mirror; second, they receive a video of the group discussion; third, they are given a report of the focus group. This article analyses how the required data are interactionally produced to be visible for the people behind the one-way screen, for the video and for the report. It describes the phenomenon of repeat receipts as a central device for producing visible data. Repeat receipts are sequences where the moderator repeats participants’contributions, typically with intonational cues that mark completion. Repeat receipts have several functions. They can (a) highlight central market-research relevant terms from participants’responses; (b) strip off rhetorical relations by repeating utterances in a decontextualized manner; (c) summarize contributions in repeating contributions of different authors as if of one voice; (d) cover conflict in repeating potentially contradictory contributions as discrete statements; (e) socialize responding by providing templates for the required contributions. Repeat receipts help shape the focus group interaction to generate visible data for the overhearing audience, the video and the report. The article ends with a comparison of repeats in market research focus groups, standardized surveys and news interviews.

Keywords

conversation analysis data visibility discursive psychology focus groups moderation repeat receipts

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Antaki, C. (1999) ‘Interviewing Persons With a Learning Disability: How Setting Lower Standards May Inflate Well-Being Scores’ , Qualitative Health Research 9(4): 437–454 .

Antaki, C. and Rapley, M. (1996) ‘“Quality of Life”Talk: The Liberal Paradox of Psychological Testing’ , Discourse &Society 7(3): 293–316 .

Antaki, C. , Houtkoop-Steenstra, H. and Rapley, M. (2000) ‘“Brilliant. Next Question...”: High-Grade Assessment Sequences in the Completion of Interactional Units’ , Research on Language and Social Interaction 33: 235–262 .

Billig, M. (1989) ‘The Argumentative Nature of Holding Strong Views: A Case Study’ , European Journal of Social Psychology 19: 203–223 .

Billig, M. (1992) Talking of the Royal Family. London: Routledge .

Billig, M. (1996) Arguing and Thinking: A Rhetorical Approach to Social Psychology(2nd edn). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press .

Branthwaite, A. and Lunn, T. (1985) ‘Projective Techniques in Social and Market Research’, in R.L. Walker (ed.) Applied Qualitative Research, pp. 101–121. London: Gower .

Garfinkel, H. (1967) Studies in Ethnomethodology. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall .

Greenbaum, T.L. (1998) The Handbook for Focus Group Research. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage .

10.

Heritage, J. (1985) ‘Analyzing News Interviews: Aspects of the Production of Talk for an Overhearing Audience’, in Teun A. van Dijk (ed.) Handbook of Discourse Analysis, vol. 3, pp. 95–119. London: Academic Press .

11.

Heritage, J. (2004) ‘Conversation Analysis and Institutional Talk’, in K. Fitch and R. Sanders (eds) Handbook of Language and Social Interaction, [in press]. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum .

12.

Heritage, J.C. and Watson, D.R. (1979) ‘Formulations as Conversational Objects’, in G. Psathas (ed.) Everyday Language: Studies in Ethnomethodology, pp. 123–162. New York: Irvington .

13.

Houtkoop-Steenstra, H. (1995) ‘Meeting Both Ends: Standardization and Recipient Design in Telephone Survey Interviews’, in P. ten Have and G. Psathas (eds) Situated Order: Studies in the Social Organization of Talk and Embodied Activities, pp. 91–106. Washington, DC: University Press of America .

14.

Houtkoop-Steenstra, H. (1996) ‘Probing Behavior of Interviewers in the Standardized Semi-Open Research Interview’ , Quality and Quantity 30: 205–230 .

15.

Houtkoop-Steenstra, H. (1997) ‘Being Friendly in Survey Interviews’ , Journal of Pragmatics 28: 591–623 .

16.

Houtkoop-Steenstra, H. (2000) Interaction and the Standardized Survey Interview: The Living Questionnaire. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press .

17.

Hutchby, I. and Wooffitt, R. (1998) Conversation Analysis: Principles, Practices and Applications. Cambridge: Polity Press .

18.

Maynard, D.W. and Schaeffer, N.C. (1997) ‘Keeping the Gate: Declinations of the Request to Participate in Telephone Survey Interview’ , Sociological Methods and Research 26: 34–79 .

19.

Maynard, D.W. and Schaeffer, N.C. (2000) ‘Standardization and its Discontents’, in D.W. Maynard , H. Houtkoop-Steenstra , N.C. Schaeffer and J. van der Zouwen (eds), Standardization and Tacit Knowledge: Interaction and Practice in the Survey Interview, pp. 3–46. New York: Wiley .

20.

Maynard, D.W. , Houtkoop-Steenstra, H. , Schaeffer, N.C. and Van der Zouwen, J. (2002) Standardization and Tacit Knowledge: Interaction and Practice in the Survey Interview. New York: Wiley .

21.

Myers, G. (1998) ‘Displaying Opinions: Topics and Disagreement in Focus Groups’ , Language in Society 27(1): 85–111 .

22.

Myers, G. and Macnaghten, P. (1999) ‘Can Focus Groups be Analysed as Talk?’, in R.S. Barbour and J. Kitzinger (eds) Developing Focus Group Research, pp. 173–185. London: Sage .

23.

Pomerantz, A.M. (1984) ‘Agreeing And Disagreeing with Assessments: Some Features of Preferred/Dispreferred Turn Shapes’, in J.M. Atkinson and J. Heritage (eds) Structures of Social Action: Studies in Conversation Analysis, pp. 57–101. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press .

24.

Potter, J. (1998) ‘Discursive Social Psychology: From Attitudes To Evaluative Practices’ , European Review of Social Psychology 9: 233–266 .

25.

Potter, J. (2003) ‘Discourse Analysis’, in M. Hardy and A. Bryman (eds) Handbook of Data Analysis, pp. 607–624. London: Sage .

26.

Potter, J. (2004) ‘Discourse Analysis as a Way of Analysing Naturally Occurring Talk’, in D. Silverman (ed.) Qualitative Analysis: Issues of Theory and Method(2nd edition), pp. 200–221. London: Sage .

27.

Potter, J. and Wetherell, M. (1987) Discourse and Social Psychology: Beyond Attitudes and Behaviour. London: Sage .

28.

Potter, J. and Wetherell, M. (1988) ‘Accomplishing Attitudes: Fact and Evaluation in Racist Discourse’ , Text 8: 51–68 .

29.

Puchta, C. and Potter, J. (1999) ‘Asking Elaborate Questions: Focus Groups and the Management of Spontaneity’ , Journal of Sociolinguistics 3: 314–335 .

30.

Puchta, C. and Potter, J. (2002) ‘Manufacturing Individual Opinions: Market Research Focus Groups and the Discursive Psychology of Evaluations’ , British Journal of Social Psychology 41: 345–363 .

31.

Puchta, C. and Potter, J. (2004) Focus Group Practice. London: Sage .

32.

Rapley, M. (2001) ‘The Art(fulness) of Open-ended Inteviewing: Some Considerations on Analysing Inteviews’ , Qualitative Research 1(3): 303–324 .

33.

Rapley, M. and Antaki, C. (1996) ‘A Conversation Analysis of the “Acquiescence”of People with Learning Difficulties’ , Journal of Community and Applied Social Psychology 6: 207–227 .

34.

Schaeffer, N.C. and Maynard, D.W. (1996) ‘From Paradigm to Prototype and Back Again: Interactive Aspects of Cognitive Processing in Standardized Survey Interviews’, in N. Schwarz and S. Sudman (eds) Answering Questions: Methodology for Determining Cognitive and Communicative Processes in Survey Research, pp. 65–88. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass .

35.

Suchman L. and Jordan, B. (1990) ‘Interactional Troubles in Face-to-Face Survey Interviews’ , in Journal of the American Statistical Association 85: 232–241 .

36.

ten Have, P. (1999) Doing Conversation Analysis. London: Sage .

37.

Verkuyten, M. (1998) ‘Attitudes in Public Discourse: Speakers’Own Orientations’ ,Journal of Language and Social Psychology 17(3): 302–322 .

38.

Wiggins, S. and Potter, J. (2003) ‘Attitudes and Evaluative Practices: Category vs. Item and Subjective vs. Objective Constructions in Everyday Food Assessments’ , British Journal of Social Psychology 42: 513–531 .