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QUALITATIVE INTERVIEW EXAMPLE
Soc 320
Fall, 2004
Two types of justice event accounts were used:
(1) A participant or self-generated account (participants
were asked to describe just and unjust events from
their lives), and
(2) Real life situations described to the participants (to
create standardized events).
Each interview consisted of five sections:
1. The participant’s general conception of justice and
injustice.
2. The participants were asked to recall five events from
their lives. The event types were:
(a) An unjust negative (bad) outcome,
(b) A just negative (bad) outcome,
(c) A just positive (good) outcome,
(d) An unjust positive (good) outcome, and
(e) A negative (bad) outcome that was not relevant to
justice.
3. The participants were asked to describe their feelings
and thoughts for each of the five events.
4. Participant’s thoughts on the justness or injustice of
three real life events. The three situations were:
(a) A murder by a 15 year old,
(b) The American Health Care system, and
(c) The case in which an elderly gentleman went to
Florida because he thought he had won a
publisher’s sweepstakes.
5. A return to their general conceptions of justice and
the scope of conditions to which justice principles
apply.
