The voices heard and the voices silenced: recruitment processes in qualitative interview studies

Abstract

This article addresses methodological questions concerning recruitment processes in research using qualitative interviews. The authors suggest that, as an active part of the research process, recruitment influences research results in sometimes unforeseen manners. They argue that recruitment processes should be better attended to – not least in research positioned within the epistemological landscapes of knowledge production and transparent reflexivity. The article draws on six studies in which qualitative interviews of ‘lay people’ were used as the sole or main source of data. Drawing on their own experiences, the authors discuss the ways in which research topics, pre-defined sample, mediators, and the researchers’ positionality and situatedness affect the recruitment of different interviewees, and, hence, also the knowledge researchers are able to produce.