This article explores the author's experiences of conducting both face-to-face and
telephone interviews with elite and ultra-elite respondents. It draws upon the
author's PhD research that uses a Sociology of Scientific Knowledge perspective to
understand the social construction of macroeconomics. The article demonstrates how
this perspective, and contributions from broader methodological texts, shaped the
evolving research practice. The author reflects upon the distance between themselves
as a relatively novice researcher and the high status position of the elite and
ultra-elite respondents. This is followed with a discussion of several practical
issues that arose from the research experience that would usefully inform the work
of any researcher considering utilising telephone interviews. The article concludes
that telephone interviewing with elite and ultra-elite respondents is both a
productive and valid research option.
Aldridge, Alan
(1993) `
Negotiating Status: Social Scientists and the Anglican Clergy
', Journal of Contemporary Ethnography22:
97—112
.
2.
Atkinson, Paul
(1990) The Ethnographic Imagination: Textual Constructions of
Reality.
London: Routledge
.
3.
Atkinson, Robert
(2002) `The Life Story Interview', in
Jaber F. Gubrium
and
James A. Holstein
(eds) Handbook of Interview Research: Context and Method, pp.
121—40.
Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage
.
4.
Breit, William
and
Hirsch, Barry T.
(2004) Lives of the Laureates: Eighteen Nobel
Economists.
Cambridge, MA: MIT Press
.
5.
Breslau, Daniel
(1997) `
Contract Shop Epistemology: Credibility and Problem Construction in Applied
Social Science
', Social Studies of Science27:
363—94
.
6.
Cassell, J.
(1988) `The Relationship of Observer to Observed when
Studying Up', in
R.G. Burgess
(ed.) Studies in Qualitative Methodology, pp.
89—108.
London : JAI Press
.
7.
Coffey, Amanda
and
Atkinson, Paul
(1996) Making Sense of Qualitative Data.
Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage
.
8.
Collins, Harry M.
(1975) `
The Seven Sexes: A Study in the Sociology of a Phenomenon, or the
Replication of Experiments in Physics
', Sociology9:
205—24
.
9.
Collins, Harry M.
(1981) `
Stages in the Empirical Programme of Relativism
', Social Studies of Science11:
3—10
.
10.
Collins, Harry M.
(1983) `An Empirical Relativist Programme in the Sociology of
Scientific Knowledge', in
Karin Knorr-Cetina
and
Michael Mulkay
(eds) Science Observed: Perspectives on the Social Study of
Science, pp. 86—113.
London: Sage
.
11.
Collins, Harry M.
(1984) `Concepts and Methods of Participatory Fieldwork
', in
C. Bell
and
H. Roberts
(eds) Social Researching, pp.
54—69.
Henley
-on-
Thames: Routledge
.
12.
Collins, Harry M.
(1992) Changing Order: Replication and Induction in
Scientific Practice (2nd Edition).
Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press
.
13.
Collins, Harry M.
(2004) Gravity's Shadow: The Search of Gravitational
Waves .
Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press
.
14.
Denzin, Norman K.
and
Lincoln, Yvonna S.
(1994) Handbook of Qualitative Research.
Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage
.
15.
Dexter, Lewis Anthony
(1970) Elite and Specialised Interviewing.
Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press
.
16.
Evans, Robert
(1997) `
Soothsaying or Science: Falsification, Uncertainty and Social Change in
Macro-economic Modelling
', Social Studies of Science27:
395—438
.
17.
Evans, Robert
(1999) Macroeconomic Forecasting: A Sociological
Appraisal .
London: Routledge
.
18.
Gilbert, G. Nigel
and
Mulkay, Michael
(1984) Opening Pandora's Box: A Sociological Analysis of
Scientist's Discourse.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
.
19.
Gilbert, Nigel
(ed.) (1993) Researching Social Life.
London: Sage
.
20.
Hammersley, Martyn
and
Atkinson, Paul
(1995) Ethnography: Principles in Practice
(2nd Edition).
London: Routledge
.
21.
Hogle, Linda F.
(2003) `Life/Time Warranty: Rechargeable Cells and Extendable
Lives', in
Sarah Franklin
and
Margaret Lock
(eds) Remaking Life and Death: Towards and Anthropology of the
Biosciences, pp. 61—98.
New Mexico: School of American Research Press
.
22.
Hunter, Albert
(1993) `
Local Knowledge and Local Power, Notes on the Ethnography of Local
Community Elites
', Journal of Contemporary Ethnography22:
35—58
.
23.
Jasanoff, S.
,
Markle, G.
,
Petersen, J.
and
Pinch, Trevor
(1994) Handbook of Science and Technology Studies.
Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage
.
24.
Knorr-Cetina, Karin
(1999) Epistemic Cultures: How the Sciences Make
Knowledge .
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press
.
25.
Latour, Bruno
and
Woolgar, Steven
(1979) Laboratory Life.
Beverly Hills, CA: Sage
.
Law, John
(1994) Organizing Modernity.
Oxford: Blackwell
.
26.
MacKenzie, Donald
(2003) `
An Equation and its Worlds: Bricolage, Exemplars, Disunity and
Performativity in Financial Economics
', Social Studies of Science33:
831—68
.
27.
MacKenzie, Donald
(2006) An Engine, Not a Camera: How Financial Models Shape
Markets.
Cambridge, MA: MIT Press
.
28.
Morrissey, Charles
(1970) `On Oral History Interviewing', in
Lewis Anthony Dexter
(ed.) Elite and Specialised Interviewing, pp.
109—18.
Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press
.
29.
Odendahl, Teresa
and
Shaw, Aileen M.
(2002) `Interviewing Elites', in
Jaber F. Gubrium
and
James A. Holstein
(eds) Handbook of Interview Research: Context and Method , pp.
299—316.
Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage
.
30.
Ostrander, Susan A.
(1993) `
Surely You're Not in This Just to be Helpful — Access, Rapport,
and Interviews in Three Studies of Elites
', Journal of Contemporary Ethnography22:
7—27
.
31.
Pearson, David L.
(2002) `Pressure Points in Academic Life', Unpublished
PhD thesis,
Cardiff University School of Social Sciences
.
32.
Pinch, Trevor F.
and
Bijker, Wiebe E.
(1987) `The Social Construction of Facts and Artifacts: Or
How the Sociology of Science and the Sociology of Technology Might Benefit Each
Other', in
Wiebe E. Bijker
,
Thomas P. Hughes
and
Trevor F. Pinch
(eds) The Social Construction of Technological Systems, pp.
17—50.
Cambridge, MA: MIT Press
.
33.
Shrum, Wesley
,
Chompalov, Ivan
and
Genuth, Joel
(2001) `
Trust, Conflict and Performance in Scientific Collaborations
', Social Studies of Science31:
681—730
.
34.
Shuy, Roger W.
(2002) `In-Person versus Telephone Interviewing', in
Jaber F. Gubrium
and
James A. Holstein
(eds) Handbook of Interview Research: Context and Method, pp.
537—55.
Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage
.
35.
Sismondo, Sergio
(2004) Introduction to Science and Technology Studies .
Oxford: Blackwell
.
36.
Snowdon, Brian
,
Vane, Howard
and
Wynarczyk, Peter
(1994) A Modern Guide to Macroeconomics: An Introduction to
Competing Schools of Thought.
Cheltenham : Edward Elgar
.
37.
Star, Susan Leigh
and
Griesemer, James R.
(1989) `
Institutional Ecology, “Translations,” and Boundary
Objects: Amateurs ad Professionals in Berkeley's Museum of Vertebrate
Zoology, 1907—39
', Social Studies of Science19:
387—420
.
38.
Stephens, Neil
(2001) `
How Economists Use Data
', Paper presented at the Social Studies of Science Society Annual
Conference , Cambridge, MA, November.
39.
Stephens, Neil
(2002) `
Political Interpretative Flexibility in Macroeconomics'
, Paper presented at the European Association for Study of
Science and Technology Annual Conference, York , UK, July.
40.
Stephens, Neil
(2005) `Why Macroeconomic Orthodoxy Changes So Quickly
— The Sociology of Scientific Knowledge and the Phillips Curve',
Unpublished PhD thesis,
Cardiff University School of Social Sciences
.
41.
Stephens, Neil
(2006) `
Political Interpretative Flexibility and the Unemployment/ Inflation Trade-off
', Paper presented at the History of Economics Society
Conference, Grinnell, IA, June.
42.
van Oost, Ellen
(2003) `Materialized Gender: How Shavers Configure the Users'
Femininity and Masculinity', in
Nelly Oudshoorn
and
Trevor F. Pinch
(eds) How Users Matter: The Co-construction of Users and
Technology , pp. 193—208.
Cambridge, MA: MIT Press
.
43.
Warren, Carol A.B.
(2002) `Qualitative Interviewing', in
Jaber F. Gubrium
and
James A. Holstein
(eds) Handbook of Interview Research: Context and Method, pp.
83—102.
Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage
.
44.
Wasserman, Elga
(2000) The Door in the Dream: Conversations with Eminent
Women in Science.
Washington, DC: Joseph Henry Press
.
45.
Winch, P.
(1958) The Idea of a Social Science.
London: Routledge
.
46.
Wittgenstein, L.
(1953) Philosophical Investigations.
Oxford: Blackwell
.
47.
Wynne, Brian
(1989) `
Sheep Farming After Chernobyl: A Case Study in Communicating Scientific Information'
, Environmental Magazine131:
33—9
.
48.
Wynne, Brian
(1996) `May the Sheep Safely Graze? A Reflexive View of the
Expert-Lay Knowledge Divide', in
Scott Lash
,
Bronislaw Szerszynski
and
Brian Wynne
(eds) Risk, Environment and Modernity: Towards a New Ecology, pp.
27—83.
London: Sage
.
49.
Yonay, Yuval
(1994) `
When Black Boxes Clash: Competing Ideas of What Science is in Economics, 1924—1939
', Social Studies of Science24:
311—42
.
