In general, the interview is considered the main way to obtain deeper and more open-ended information, and it often enables the researcher to gain insight into unexpected, hidden factors. The interview has been seen as an appropriate method for gaining an understanding of the realities of a situation, as well as for understanding people’s perceptions. Henn, Weinstein and Foard highlight the fact that the in-depth interview and participant observation are common methods in qualitative research (2006: 160). For this thesis, semi-structured interviews were used as the main data collection tool.
Interview design and categories
The term interview refers to a situation in which an interviewer asks questions of respondents and receives his or her answers. This apparently simple process is, however, a more difficult task than it may seem. No matter how carefully the researcher prepares and asks the questions, verbal replies can be more ambiguous than data from written documents.
According to Fontana and Frey, the most common types of interview are individual face-to-face verbal interviews. There are other forms of interview, such as group interviews, mail interviews using questionnaires and telephone surveys (1994: 361). Interviews can also be divided into structured, semi-structured and unstructured interviews, depending on their purpose. The continuum model for interviews, created by Minichiello et al., can be used to show the relation between the degree of structure in an interview and the depth of the interview. This figure suggests that more structured interviews are suitable for surveys.
In contrast, unstructured interviews are more suited for in-depth research.
Figure 4.1 The continuum model for interviews Structured interviews Focused or semi-structured
interviews
Unstructured interviews
Standardised interviews Survey interviews Clinical history-taking
In-depth interviews Survey interviews Group interviews
In-depth interviews Clinical interviews Group interviews Oral or life-history interviews
Source: Minichiello et al. (1990; cited by Punch, 2005: 169)
The type of interview utilised should be aligned with the strategy, purposes and research questions (Punch, 2005: 170). Fontana and Frey state that the aim of a structured interview is to capture precise data within pre-established categories, whereas that of an unstructured interview is to understand the complex behaviour of humans, a society or a certain phenomenon within the field of inquiry (1994: 366). For the purposes of this thesis, semi-structured interviews were chosen because a semi-semi-structured interview seems to be more
suitable for comprehending the context of broadcasting programme exports as well as producing valuable data, in contrast to a highly structured interview, which has little room for elaboration and discussion around the questions. Approximately ten or more open-ended questions were prepared ahead of time, relating to the situation of each respondent.
Along with the interview structure, the selection of respondents and the specific questions asked were seen as the keys to good interviewing. The principal selection criteria for choosing the respondent in this research were three-fold: the experts on broadcast programme exports working at terrestrial stations or as independent agents were regarded as the most important respondents, since they have sufficient experience of and opinions on both general drama exports and their contextual background and wider implications.
The experienced personnel in the drama industry, who were able to give distinctive perspectives on the development of the drama industry both industrially and culturally, were considered the next most important. Lastly, the policy-makers and researchers, who not only have wide knowledge and a neutral perspective on government policies but are also able to evaluate these, were regarded as suitable respondents. All 33 respondents were categorised into four groups, depending on the focus of each questionnaire. These groups were policy-makers, drama exporters, drama creators and media studies researchers.
First, the questionnaire for the policy-maker group was designed to investigate the background, intention and operation of policies for the support of the cultural industries or broadcasting industry during the research period. The policy-maker group, which consisted of eight respondents, was divided again into two small groups, one composed of the civil servants from MCST, and the other of the researchers from KOCCA, the main government foundation involved in studying and operating policies to support the cultural industries.
Whilst the first group concentrated on explanation or justification of the government’s role in the cultural industry support policies, the KOCCA researchers in the second group tended to maintain a more neutral position when estimating policy enactment and operation.
Respondents’ details and the criteria for selecting them are described in Table 4.1.
Table 4.1 List of respondents in the policy-maker group
Name Position Reason for choosing as respondent
Park
Kim Jang-ho Director of Broadcasting and Advertising Division at MCST
Kim Chul-min Director of Cultural Industry Policy Division at MCST
Koo Kyung-bon
President of US office of KOCCA Koo explained the overall map of the government policy plan for the cultural industries.
Yoon Ho-jin Head of Industry Policy Strategy Division at KOCCA Yoon Jae-sik Senior Researcher of Industry Policy
Strategy Division at KOCCA
Anonymous civil servant at MCST This person provided information about the Korean Wave support policies during the period from the mid 2000s.
The second respondent group consisted of twelve drama export personnel employed in the sales subsidiaries of broadcasting stations or working as independent broadcasting programme export agents. This group responded to the questionnaire mainly regarding the practical procedures of drama exports, reactions of the overseas Korean drama market and the actual impact of government support on drama exports. In many cases, their statements provided essential clues for analysing the historical and political context of Korean drama exports. Details of respondents and the selection criteria for this group are shown in Table 4.2.
62 This individual requested that the author not reveal his name in this study.
Table 4.2 List of respondents in the drama exporters group
Name Position Reason for choosing as respondent
Chang Han-sung
1st President of KBS Media As former presidents of KBS Media, Chang and Park described
Park In-soo Head of programme export team at KBS Media
Park Jae-bok President of the Japanese office of MBC, Former General Manager of MBC
President of Japanese office of KOCCA Kim described the Japanese response to Korean dramas and in particular the special implications of the popularity of Winter Sonata.63
Kim Sang-han Independent programme export agent Kim described the early appearance of Korean dramas on Taiwanese
Goh Jeong-min Former head of cable channel team at Samsung Entertainment Group
63 Winter Sonata (KBS, 2002) is the first Korean drama broadcast on the Japanese terrestrial station, NHK Japan in 2003. This melodrama enjoyed an unprecedented popularity among Japanese middle-aged female viewers, so much so that it was actually described as a social syndrome. The popularity of Winter Sonata and its implications will be analysed further in Chapters 5 and 7.
The third respondent group was made up of seven drama writers and producers, who explained how they had been influenced by the overseas popularity of their dramas and how political and economic factors had affected Korean drama production. In particular, they explained the formation of the specific characteristics of the Korean drama industry and how these characteristics had affected or been connected to the overseas popularity of Korean dramas.
Table 4.3 List of respondents in the drama creators group
Name Position Reason for choosing as respondent
Kim Young-hyun
Drama writer Kim and Cho are respectively the
writer and producer of Jewel in the
Former chief producer at MBC Kim explained the development of the Korean drama industry and
Park Sang-joo Independent drama producer Park explained drama production circumstances after Korean dramas became popular in the overseas market.
Moon So-san Drama writer and former KBS producer Moon explained the relationship between drama producers and drama writers and the intensifying competition among stations for drama viewing rates.
The fourth respondent group, composed of six media studies researchers, mainly described the academic perceptions of the Korean Wave and evaluated the government’s role in the
64 Broadcasting Worldwide Exhibition and Conference
policies for support of the Korean Wave. They generally admitted that academics could not have anticipated the overseas popularity of Korean popular cultural content, and stated that it was not until the early 2000s that academics, who were rather negative about the prospects for popular domestic content exports, began to acknowledge their overseas success.
Table 4.4 List of respondents in media studies researchers group
Name Position Reason for choosing as respondent
Shim Doo-bo Professor of Media Studies at Sungshin Women’s University
Shim is the one of the leading scholars who has studied the Korean Wave since the early 2000s.
Joo Chang-yun Professor of Media Studies at Seoul Women’s University
Cho Hang-je Professor of Media Studies at Busan National University respondents prior to conducting the interviews, since most interviewees requested information about the research project and the content of their interviews. However, the actual interviews did not always follow the format of the questionnaire and interviews were often individually tailored, with open-ended questions deliberately used. The four questionnaires for each group are attached as an appendix.
Access to respondents and conducting the interviews
Interviews with the 33 respondents were conducted mainly during two fieldwork visits to Korea in the summers of 2010 and 2011. Typically, gaining access to experts for the conducting of interviews was not easy, broadcasting personnel such as producers, writers and programme creators being exceptionally busy people. In order to obtain satisfactory data from the interviews in a limited period of time, Doyle and Frith advise the collection of information about respondents prior to conducting the interview (2006: 560). The preparation of all equipment and other necessary material such as a voice recorders and questionnaires is also essential. In reality, the preparation for interviews consumes more time and energy than conducting the interviews.
In most interviews, the intention was to obtain the respondent’s views about the export performance of dramas, rather than to collect an exact answer for each question. Most respondents showed a genuine interest in being interviewed, and were willing to be involved in this academic research. The willingness of respondents to be involved enabled this researcher to uncover a number of hitherto hidden factors and to construct a map of the broadcasting industry of Korea.
The main problem in conducting interviews was that it was not easy to identify suitable respondents who had both breadth of experience and a willingness to voice their own opinions about drama exports. In fact, some nominated respondents could not, or would not, provide detailed information or their own perspectives even though they had ample working experience in the field. Moreover, it was not easy to gain all the required information at a single interview, so several respondents were asked to send further answers through follow-up e-mail interviews, or to attend additional interviews in the second round of fieldwork carried out in 2011.
Prior to the interviews, all respondents were given an outline of the research and signed a consent form in which they agreed that their opinions could be cited in academic articles.
Most interviews were completed within one hour or one and a half hours because the respondents all had busy schedules and were therefore limited in the time that they could give. All interviews, except two which were conducted over the telephone, were recorded with a digital voice recorder. Interestingly, while most respondents preferred face-to-face
interviews, only two civil servants from MCST declined face-to-face interviews and sent their written replies by e-mail. It is assumed that they were reluctant to give their opinions extemporaneously in face-to-face interviews. Moreover, another civil servant from MCST who criticised the Korean Wave support policies requested that the author not reveal his name in this research.
The strengths and limitations of the interview method
Clearly, the strength of the interview method of research is its ability to engage in ‘real time’ dialogue that can reveal the particular experiences and views of the respondent.
Indeed, the serial interviews provided the researcher with the opportunity to uncover the genuine circumstances of the Korean broadcasting and drama industries. Even though other methods may provide valuable data, written data cannot produce the same lively narratives or hidden stories and backgrounds that the interview respondents revealed through frank discussions. Respondents were able to provide detailed explanations for how the original aim of each policy had succeeded, failed or been misunderstood in practical terms which have not been recorded in documents.
Another noteworthy point is that additional information can be gained thanks to the relationship between interviewer and respondents. In effect, after a rapport had been created between interviewer and respondent, several respondents revealed the hidden background to policy-making. Although the respondents may have described some details as trivial facts, in most cases, their ‘trivial facts’ may well offer crucial clues to filling the gap between written policies and practical policy operations. The rapport which was created during the interviews was also helpful in gaining follow-up information after the end of the fieldwork.
Nonetheless, the strength of the interview can be double-edged. The closeness between the interviewer and the respondents may unwittingly allow subjectivity into the process. In fact, most respondents clearly have their own biased point of view, and it can be difficult to differentiate between their biased viewpoint and neutral facts. A lack of neutrality has been identified as the major concern about the interview as a research method, since research techniques require objectivity and detachment (Denzin and Lincoln, 1994: 353).
Even if the researcher is able to maintain neutrality, the possibility remains that bias, dishonesty, faulty memory or self-deception on the part of respondents may inadvertently affect the accuracy of the data (Punch, 2005: 176). Thus, the researcher needs to manage the conversational process of the interview cautiously, keeping to the prepared track and trying not to be overly influenced by the respondents’ responses, or indeed to overly influence the respondents. In addition, the limits of time and the difficulty of selecting suitable respondents are counted as the main drawbacks of the interview method.