prelims
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methods (Nirenberg 1963). As rapport develops, you may notice a distinct sigh of relief, signaling a lessening of the interviewee’s distress and the building of trust. From that point onward, the interview may take on a more relaxed character.
You need to be alert to whether the interviewee is truly listening. Just because interviewees are silent and appear to be listening does not mean that they are truly receptive to what you are saying.
They may be lost in an emotional maze of fear. Periodically ask questions designed to test whether the interviewee is listening.
A blank, unresponsive stare may signal distress, unclear thinking, or an imbalanced mental process.
Control your emotions without losing your enthusiasm.
Keep your thoughts collected and composed; think your comments through carefully before presenting them to the interviewee. Refuse to become ruffled, and keep your goal clearly in mind. The use of sarcasm, ridicule, or cynicism creates tension that does not help to build rapport and gain the interviewee’s cooperation (Benjamin 1974, p. 153). “Most people resist being thought of as inferior; therefore, they would be very reluctant to establish rapport with or to be persuaded by anyone who tries, consciously or unconsciously, to make them feel inferior” (Downs et al. 1980, p. 264). Instead, help the interviewer to rationalize and save face. Other actions that tend to block rapport are making negative comments, engaging in monologues, second-guessing the interviewee, displaying a condescending attitude, and trying to hurry through the interview (Downs et al. 1980, p. 201).
Through participant role reversal, an interviewee may skillfully unseat you and take over the role of leader in the interview.
An inexperienced interviewer may not see the signals and may discover too late that he or she has given up command of the interview, answering rather than asking questions. This role reversal is embarrassing only if it continues. Proficient interviewers realize when role reversal is taking place and immediately regain control without making it too obvious or causing conflict.
Entering into a power struggle with interviewees creates alienation instead of friendly rapport (Nirenberg 1963).
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When ending an unsuccessful interview, do nothing to create hard feelings. Even when hostile interviewees refuse to answer your questions, don’t hold a grudge, show no disgust, frustration, or anger, and don’t allow yourself to vent your displeasure. Don’t allow your pride to cause you to blame interviewees for their lack of cooperation. Instead, lay a positive foundation for future interviews. Aim to have all interviewees leave with a positive feeling, allowing them to believe that they experienced a meaningful and valuable interaction.
ACTIVE LISTENING
“His thoughts were slow, his words were few, and never made to glisten. But he was a joy wherever he went. You should have heard him listen.”
—Anonymous
There are two main conditions of listening: the passive (inattentive) and the active (attentive). Most of us are good at passive listening. We appear to be listening when, in fact, our minds have wandered off. Too often, our need to talk is greater than our ability to listen.
To become an effective interviewer, you should learn to overcome this human failing (Benjamin 1974, p. 86). A good interviewer is a good listener (Dexter 1970, p. 111). By staying keenly aware of the important role of active listening in an interview, you can analyze and encourage in a meaningful way. You can use active listening skills to determine the interviewee’s frame of reference and to reduce emotional tension. Rely on your spontaneity, sensitivity, and basic common sense; listen better and understand more. Avoid putting on a show of authority, displaying more interest in yourself and your role than in listening to the interviewee.
Most people feel that no one really listens to them. They appreciate an opportunity to show their knowledge and to express their ideas and feelings (Bennis et al. 1973, p. 541). They hunger for that feeling of importance when approached for their views.
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The first step in empathizing is to listen and attempt to grasp the meaning of what is said. Your effort to listen actively demonstrates your recognition of the interviewee’s worth and encourages continued cooperation. Active listening involves your total person and must be a part of your presentation. You can exhibit your attentiveness to the interviewee through the intonation of your voice, the positioning of your body, and your facial expressions. By questioning, accepting, rephrasing, reflecting, and pausing, you can signal that you are listening (Nirenberg 1963).
The important tactic of active listening requires attentiveness and concentration, acceptance, detachment, and patience.
We will discuss each of these qualities before exploring in more detail how the interviewer can signal active listening.
Attentiveness and Concentration
“Finding the perfect listener, gaining that sense of relaxation from being able to talk or not talk when one wants to, is one of the greater pleasures.”
—Eliot D. Chapple (Anthropologist, as quoted in Davis 1975, p. 117) With a little effort, you can learn to be a “perfect listener”: Be alert and courteous, give the interviewee your undivided attention, and be ready with appropriate questions or comments to show interest in what the interviewee says. The benefits of such attentiveness are numerous. There is a close connection between active listening and intuition; active listening helps you sense meanings that are not revealed in words alone. The development of rapport is built upon a foundation partly made up of your ability to show that you are listening. Your attentiveness implies acceptance and encourages the interviewee to say more. It allows the interviewee to sense the genuine, unplanned, spontaneous you. In the end, being attentive to the interviewee helps you achieve your ultimate goal: gathering truthful information.
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Give the interviewee your full attention. Ponder, at least momentarily, each of the interviewee’s comments. People can sense if you are truly interested by the subtle way you pause to reflect on what they say. As an active listener, your attention should not be fickle or fragile or fall apart at the least distraction or promise of pleasure, excitement, or frustration (Nirenberg 1963).
Avoid an indifferent attitude. One way of turning people off is to not pay attention to their comments—to be thinking of the next question to ask and not devoting yourself fully to the emotion of the moment. Preoccupied glances, slack body posture, and inappropriate silences and comments all imply boredom.
Inattentive listeners do not truly hear what is being said; they superficially signal hearing and responding, but no real thoughts are formulated. They are a bit out of rhythm with the conversation and the mood of the interaction. In a fast-moving interview, they fail to provide sharp, alert, quick responses.
People can sense when you are preoccupied, bored, or inattentive. Interviewees who sense that you are bored or that your interest is not genuine may feel used by you. When facing an inattentive listener, they tend to regard the interaction as a waste of time and may hold back information. Because they may not outwardly express their reasons for withdrawing, you may never realize that your inattention stopped the flow of information.
Active listening means concentrating on what is and what is not being said—both verbally and nonverbally (Nierenberg 1968). Evaluate the interviewee’s subjective comments in light of his or her emotional state, attitudes, and values. Use every advantage to analyze the story you hear to make it sensible (Woody and Woody 1972, p. 147). Attempt to determine the interviewee’s frame of reference, and be guided by what you learn (Dexter 1970, p. 19). Evaluating interviewees properly helps you determine how hurriedly you can conduct the interview and what direction it should take. Interviewees who feel rushed may sense that you are insincere in your efforts, and they may become less cooperative (Wicks 1972).
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Always be alert for signals of the interviewee’s mental processes, and look for clues of motivation and hidden needs. As you listen to what the interviewee has to say, continually observe the way he or she acts. Through mannerisms, gestures, recurrent phrases, and modes of expression, interviewees signal their thinking, their hidden needs, and possible deception. Avoid idle thinking by concentrating on the specifics of the interview. Get into the mood of data gathering, and listen constructively.
Allowing the interviewee’s comments to glide over the surface of your mind is self-defeating (Nirenberg 1963). Concentrate!
Some inexperienced interviewers are so busy thinking of their next question that they forget to listen to the interviewee’s answers. Devious interviewees can take advantage of the investigator’s inattention by making innocuous comments or failing to answer questions. If you don’t concentrate your thinking, deceptive interviewees with moderate skills can too easily mislead you.
Even evasive interviewees, who are not really deceptive but only reluctant or hesitant to comply, can mislead you if you aren’t paying attention. Some interviewees play mental games with authority figures to test their sincerity (Nirenberg 1963).
Acceptance
The listener who exhibits nonjudgmental understanding, who provides empathic responses, encourages others to continue to communicate. By actively listening to interviewees, you signal your acceptance of them, and they intuitively sense that it is okay to talk to you. Empathize with their attitudes, the roles they are playing, their expressed and demonstrated needs.
Like most people, interviewees often think that what they have to say is the most important thing in the world, and they continually evaluate their listeners. If you are receptive, understanding, warm, responsive, interested, and involved, interviewees will probably enter a dialogue with you. They are responsive in a productive, permissive atmosphere. While interviewees expect and appreciate appropriate responses to their comments, they don’t
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necessarily seek an evaluation. They need reassurance, support, and acceptance while revealing their thoughts and exposing their secrets. Recognizing the interviewee’s dignity, worth, and importance, and helping the interviewee strive for self-expression, self-realization, and self-fulfillment, improves the productivity of the interview. Sensing your helping, friendly attitude, the interviewee will probably cooperate as expected.
The ideal interviewer listens with nonjudgmental understanding and does not criticize or admonish (Garrett 1972, p. 20).
By exhibiting genuine interest, you can avoid injecting your opinions, value judgments, and criticisms into the interview. When interviewees sense that you are evaluating them with your personal set of values, they may become defensive, which will curtail the flow of information. Try to maintain a universal set of values as well as your personal set of values. Neatly tuck your personal values away when you interview. Maintain the attitude that no behavior is too aggressive, no feeling too guilty or shameful, for the interviewee to bring into the interview.
Use sounds and actions to signal your acceptance of the interviewee. Murmur vocal sounds like “uh-huh” at appropriate times during the interview. Display facial expressions and use gestures that demonstrate attentiveness (Davis 1975; Downs et al. 1980, p. 78). If the interviewee talks spontaneously, avoid interrupting until there is a significant pause. Encourage the interviewee to continue by nodding your head and paying careful attention to the interviewee’s words (Woody and Woody 1972, p. 154).
Detachment
Occasionally you may need to investigate crimes that are so hor-rible that they shake you to your very core or turn your stomach.
As you investigate crimes that would anger any normal citizen, you may feel distracted by intense internal dissonance, an absence of internal harmony (Bennis et al. 1973, p. 203). When you are expected to remain calm and listen, your body cannot vent the pent-up pressure caused by stress. No matter what the
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circumstances, don’t be thrown off balance. Don’t become so angry that you want to seek revenge on behalf of the victim.
Remain detached, and gain the interviewee’s cooperation by treating him or her with kindness, decency, and human dignity (Nierenberg 1968). Being somewhat depersonalized helps the interviewer react with calm acceptance toward the interviewee.
Be secure in your personal identity. Understand yourself, and maintain a sturdy philosophical core around your personal and cultural values. Learn to use self-selected identities without
“injuring” the core of your personality (Dexter 1970, p. 27).
When interviewees respond to your questions in an angry outburst, detach yourself and be ready to withstand the heat. Don’t react in a defensive, defiant manner. You might say, “I see your point of view,” or “I understand what you mean.” You will only alienate the interviewee if you react to emotional tirades with threats and insults or if you fall back on your position of authority and demand that the interviewee remain civil (Nierenberg 1968).
Patience
“If thou art one to whom petition is made, be calm as thou listenest to what the petitioner has to say. Do not rebuff him before he has swept out his body or before he has said that for which he came. The petitioner likes attention to his words better than the fulfilling of that for which he came. . . .
It is not necessary that everything about which he has petitioned should come to pass, but a good hearing is soothing to the heart.”
—The instruction of PTAH–HOTEP, 3000 B.C., to his son (Gunn 1918) Inexperienced interviewers often rush from one question to another without waiting for an answer. They fail to understand that patience is a necessary component of active listening (Dexter 1970, p. 112). Impatience signals ridicule, cynicism, and intimidation and blocks rapport. Impatience toward interviewees is self-defeating and can only be characterized as abusive and
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judgmental. Rather than use rapid-fire questions, proficient interviewers allow interviewees time to answer fully without interruption, thereby showing interest and attentiveness. By speaking softly, slowly, and firmly, they signal that they are capable of both comprehending and solving the investigative problem. With composure, serenity, and emotional strength, they advance toward their goal. That calmness and strength are patience at work.
To be a good listener, you should take the backseat and allow the interviewee time to talk (Wicks and Josephs 1972). As they talk, interviewees generally begin to feel comfortable enough to reveal the information you need. Avoid making superfluous comments, and remain alert to what is going on moment by moment (Nirenberg 1963). It is through expressed emotion at times of tension that interviewees test your sincerity, compassion, and caring (Garrett 1972, p. 50). Your patience in an interview signals tolerance, acceptance, and understanding while it stimulates dialogue.
Patience carries with it forgiveness and respect for interviewees.
Painstakingly and patiently advance point by point and item by item toward your goal. If the interviewee becomes hostile or indignant, try to remain calm and appeal for cooperation. “Be patient and persistent to overcome hidden, irrational interviewee opposition” (Nirenberg 1963, p. 132). Do not rebuff the interviewee. As Benjamin Disraeli, the late British prime minister, said, “Next to knowing when to seize an advantage, the most important thing in life is to know when to forego an advantage.”
Your patience is vital in the face of an emotional outburst. A sensitive response to a victim or witness in distress is essential in reducing the person’s fear. Permit interviewees to discharge their stored anger or pain in an emotional dumping process. Listen to interviewees as though you think they have something worthwhile to offer. Your patience gives interviewees time to rid themselves of tension (Wicks and Josephs 1972). However, they may enter into a meanderi
ng conversation to rest and to test the degree of your patience (Nirenberg 1963). The strength of your gentleness, patience, and kindness leads to confidence in your judgment.
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Be alert to both concrete and abstract information. Concrete, objective explanations paint a clear picture of the event or situation. Abstract, subjective comments are emotional, nonspecific, and often misleading. Strive to obtain concrete information, but accept that the interviewee will also express emotion and make many subjective comments. Take comfort and reassurance from William Keefe’s comment that “eventually [the interviewer] may spend less time as he winnows more skillfully the valuable information from the valueless” (Keefe 1971, p. 24).
As your career progresses, you will come in contact with many different personality types. Some interviewees are impulsive, egotistical, and childish, with a low tolerance for frustration. Others are better at controlling their impulses and will seek to collaborate with you to solve the crime. Your patience can guide the inquiry, no matter what personality type you need to interview.
SIGNALING ACTIVE LISTENING
Although verbal communication is the most distinctive of human achievements, nonverbal communication, including body language, touch, and positive silence, is equally important. Feelings and intentions are conveyed through body posture and movement, gestures, facial expressions, and eye contact. In fact, expectations are conveyed mostly through nonverbal communication.
Nonverbal communication, which is learned throughout life, reveals underlying personality traits, subconscious attitudes, intentions, and conflicts. Use it to your advantage in an interview.
Express your willingness to listen to the interviewee by engaging your whole body in the communication process and not merely your words. Move forward in your chair, nod your head, wear a curious expression, and smile to encourage the interviewee to continue speaking. Some interviewers are highly skilled in the use of nonverbal communication. Others can learn how to use body language, touch, and positive silence to express their positive expectations and willingness to listen.