Interviews, focus groups, and Delphi techniques

Most applied psychologists are employed in four main areas: clinical, educational, occupational psychology and government service e.g. as prison psychologists (Hartley and Branthwaite, 2000:1). Whether practitioner and/or researcher much of what they do involves exploring people's experiences and behaviour. Nearly eighty years ago, the American psychologist, Gordon Allport, expressed the view that if you want to know something about people's activities the best way of finding out is to ask them. The three methods described in this chapter offer distinct ways of doing this.