Amri Michelle, Angelakis Christina, Logan Dilani
Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto, 155 College Street, Toronto, ON, M5T 1P8, Canada.
Takemi Program in International Health, Harvard School of Public Health, Harvard University, 665 Huntington Avenue, Bldg. 1, Room 1210, Boston, MA, 02115-6021, USA.
BMC Res Notes. 2021 Apr 20;14(1):148. doi: 10.1186/s13104-021-05547-2.
Through collating observations from various studies and complementing these findings with one author's study, a detailed overview of the benefits and drawbacks of asynchronous email interviewing is provided. Through this overview, it is evident there is great potential for asynchronous email interviews in the broad field of health, particularly for studies drawing on expertise from participants in academia or professional settings, those across varied geographical settings (i.e. potential for global public health research), and/or in circumstances when face-to-face interactions are not possible (e.g. COVID-19).
Benefits of asynchronous email interviewing and additional considerations for researchers are discussed around: (i) access transcending geographic location and during restricted face-to-face communications; (ii) feasibility and cost; (iii) sampling and inclusion of diverse participants; (iv) facilitating snowball sampling and increased transparency; (v) data collection with working professionals; (vi) anonymity; (vii) verification of participants; (viii) data quality and enhanced data accuracy; and (ix) overcoming language barriers. Similarly, potential drawbacks of asynchronous email interviews are also discussed with suggested remedies, which centre around: (i) time; (ii) participant verification and confidentiality; (iii) technology and sampling concerns; (iv) data quality and availability; and (v) need for enhanced clarity and precision.
通过整理各项研究的观察结果，并以一位作者的研究对这些发现加以补充，对异步电子邮件访谈的利弊进行了详细概述。通过这一概述可以明显看出，异步电子邮件访谈在广泛的健康领域具有巨大潜力，特别是对于借鉴学术界或专业领域参与者专业知识的研究、涉及不同地理环境的研究（即全球公共卫生研究的潜力），以及/或者在无法进行面对面互动的情况下（例如新冠疫情期间）。
围绕以下方面讨论了异步电子邮件访谈的优点以及对研究人员的其他考虑因素：（i）超越地理位置以及在受限的面对面交流期间的可及性；（ii）可行性和成本；（iii）抽样和纳入不同参与者；（iv）促进滚雪球抽样并提高透明度；（v）与在职专业人员进行数据收集；（vi）匿名性；（vii）参与者验证；（viii）数据质量和提高数据准确性；以及（ix）克服语言障碍。同样，也讨论了异步电子邮件访谈的潜在缺点并提出了补救建议，这些缺点主要围绕：（i）时间；（ii）参与者验证和保密性；（iii）技术和抽样问题；（iv）数据质量和可用性；以及（v）需要提高清晰度和精确性。
