How many participants are enough for a research interview?

Research scholars across the globe tend to get confused when it comes to deciding about the count for the participants in the interview conducted in order to gather important data related to the research topic. This post of mine would allow my readers to get an idea about the number of participants which need to participate in a research interview.

New interviewers frequently ask how many participants they must have in their study. Some researchers argue for an emergency research design in which the number of participants in a study is not established ahead of time. If I talk about enough participants in a research interview, there are two criteria for enough. The first is sufficiency. You need to find an answer to the question as to whether there are sufficient numbers to reflect the range of participants and sites that make up the population so that others outside the sample might have a chance to connect to the experiences of those in it. A huge population of research scholars is reluctant to interview only one person in any particular category.

Another criterion for deciding the count of interview participants is the saturation of information. As per a survey, it has been found that around 25 participants is a good count because collecting similar kind of information can be a mere wastage of time and efforts. Interviewing fewer participants may save time earlier in the study, but may add complications and frustration at the point of working with, analyzing and interpreting the interview data. One of the major concerns of every researcher is to ensure that the entire interviewing session should be pleasurable, rather than laborious.