An Introduction to Clean Language Interviewing for Research

Chapter Summary In this chapter we state the aims and scope of the book and its intended audience. The chapter describes clean language, explaining its origins and how it has developed from a psychotherapeutic approach into a practice with an international presence in varied fields of application such as coaching, business and education. We introduce the focus of this book, which is the use of clean language for the purpose of research interviews. Clean language questions, which are fundamental to this approach, are presented, and we describe four levels at which clean language interviewing can be applied. Issues of ethical practice are addressed. The chapter concludes with an outline of the applications of clean language interviewing that feature in the chapters in Part II. NB In this book the terms ‘clean language’ and ‘clean language interviewing’ are written using lower case, according to the convention of the American Psychological Association (sixth edition). ‘Clean language interviewing’ is sometimes abbreviated to CLI.