I have conducted hundreds of interviews with people from around the world – and before every new interview project I believe it is critical to review and discuss essential qualitative interview skills. I recently had the opportunity to lead a training session with dfusion staff and interns for exploratory interviews for SocialWise — our AI-enhanced conversation agent designed to help autistic young adults build social and communication skills. The goal was to prepare our team to listen with purpose to autistic young adults, and collect the kind of rich, honest data that comes from a genuinely respectful conversation.
Here are 8 qualitative interview skills that our SocialWise dfusion team values.
- Start with purpose and humility
Every interview should begin with two things firmly in mind: why you’re asking, and who’s the expert. You are not the expert on someone else’s lived experience — they are. Interviewers, especially newer ones, often feel the pressure to seem knowledgeable or in control. Letting go of that instinct and coming ready to learn is what earns trust and results in better data.
- Listen more, talk less
Active listening during an interview means doing three things at once:
- Track the content — what is the person actually saying?
- Listen for the “inside voice” — the thoughtful, honest response, not just the polished, socially acceptable one.
- Stay aware of timing and energy — how much time is left, and how much energy the participant has left to give.
That’s a lot to hold in your head at once, and it’s not how most of us talk in everyday conversation. A few concrete habits make it easier:
- Take notes instead of just listening. Note-taking keeps your brain anchored on what’s being said, and for this project specifically, interviews aren’t recorded — taking notes can help participants feel more at ease.
- Link back and link forward. Referencing something a participant said earlier (“You mentioned this before — do you have more to add?”) shows them you’re paying attention and builds rapport.
- Use “navigational nudges.” If someone goes off on a tangent, gently pull out the piece that’s useful and steer back: “That’s really interesting — can we come back to that?” It’s a nudge, not a redirect, and participants should never feel cut off.
- Prompt, don’t poke
Focus on follow-ups as prompting questions, used only when a conversation stalls, when someone seems unsure where to go, or when they need more context. (Some interviewers talk about probing questions – but to me that sounds like you are poking them. ) Useful prompts include “Can you give me an example?” or “What would make you feel that way?” One word to avoid almost entirely: why. It tends to put people on the defensive.
- Ask when you’re not sure — don’t assume
Don’t paraphrase someone’s meaning in your notes; write down their actual words, especially if they use a phrase that surprises you or that you haven’t heard in that context before. If something could mean more than one thing, ask. A good way to check your understanding, borrowed from motivational interviewing, is to summarize back what you heard and ask if you got it right.
- Tolerate silence
Silence can feel uncomfortable to sit in, but it usually means someone is thinking, not that something’s wrong. Rushing to fill it can cut off a more thoughtful answer before it forms.
- Be guided by your protocol, not tied to it
Your interview protocol is your data collection instrument, not a script. It’s fine — even preferable — to jump around if a participant brings up something important out of order. In n exploratory interview, a natural conversation beats a stilted march through numbered questions.
- Practice matters
Conducting rich qualitative interviews does not come naturally, it requires practice. Table reads, mock interviews, and running through the protocol out loud with a colleague all help surface awkward phrasing or missing examples before you’re talking with a real participant.
- Prepare specifically for your participants’ shared qualities
Interview participants are selected to be part of an interview because they share some characteristic or commonality that is important to the purpose of your study. In preparing to interview autistic young adults, we keep in mind:
- Ask about language preference up front. Some people prefer identity-first language (“autistic person”), others prefer person-first (“person with autism”). Ask, and use what they tell you.
- Share questions in advance. Surprises can be stressful; giving people the chance to prepare supports comfort and honest answers.
- Give explicit control. Let participants know they can skip any question, type answers in chat instead of speaking, take a break, or ask to go through questions in order rather than following a tangent.
- Don’t assume silence means distraction. If someone pauses, it’s fine to ask gently — “just thinking, or do you need a minute?” — rather than guessing.
- Rapport-building starts before the interview even begins, in how you word your recruitment messages, confirmation emails, and introduction.
- Review the Meet in the Middle videos. This collection of our SkillFlix videos can help neurotypical people increase their understanding of autism and improve the communication skills needed to interact with people on the autism spectrum.
Interviewing well is less about executing a perfect script and more about staying curious, staying humble, and being ready to put the protocol down when the conversation calls for it. That’s especially true when the goal is to hear, as honestly as possible, what autistic young adults want out of a learning technology tool.
Are you between ages 18-28 and identify as autistic or neuro-diverse and willing to share your insights on technology use and AI? dfusion Inc. needs your help as we develop a new resource to meet the needs of autistic young adults! We are conducting one-time 20-minute interviews with autistic young adults to help develop new neuro-affirming resources.
Can you help? Please fill out this interview eligibility form
About the author
BA Laris has spent over 30 years asking people questions — from elementary school students to senior citizens and everything in-between; in classrooms, kitchens, crowded streets, and over unpredictable Zoom connections spanning the globe. She’s talked to people about everything from sex ed to substance use recovery to what makes a video game fun, and she’s pretty sure she’s been technically “the person in charge” and “not at all the expert” in the same conversation more times than she can count. These days she leads the SkillFlix AYA + SocialWise project, where she gets to do what she loves most: listen more, talk less, and let autistic young adults tell her how to make awesome ed tech tools.
