Interviewing Children
Launch library · evergreen read
Children require an approach substantially different from interviewing adults: simpler language, careful attention to whether they genuinely understand what they are being asked, and heightened awareness of how easily a child's answer can be shaped, unintentionally, by the way a question is framed. A question that seems perfectly clear to an adult can easily confuse a much younger subject.
Consent carries particular weight in this context, typically involving a parent or guardian alongside the child themselves, and an ethical interviewer treats both layers of consent as genuinely necessary rather than a formality to be worked around quickly. Both layers of consent deserve genuine attention, not a quick formality rushed through before the real conversation begins.
The obligation to protect a child subject extends well beyond the interview itself, into careful consideration of how the material will be used and what consequences, foreseeable or not, publication might carry for the child long after the conversation has ended. That obligation does not end when the recording stops, but extends into every later decision about the material.