How to Write an Interview Report? (An Example)

 Interviewing Report

            NAME: Lavinia (pseudonym )                                   DATE OF BIRTH: 1995

 AGE: 22                                                                     DATE OF INTAKE: 30.10.17

INTAKE INTERVIEWER: Didem UZUN               DATE OF REPORT: 14.11.17

This single-session clinical interview lasted about an hour and a half. It was conducted in a room that was isolated from the factors that would interrupt the flow of the interview. An informed consent has been signed to ensure the rights of the counsellor and client and to agree in written form about the nature of the counsel. As a general impression, the end of the meeting the two sides were left by expressing their satisfaction to each other.

            A 22-year-old young woman volunteered for an interview. The participant is living together with her family in Turkey, Ankara. She is a first-year undergraduate psychology student in the same city. She is the only child, has no other sisters or brothers. Both her mother and her father have an active business life. The socio-economic status of her family meets normal standards. In this report, the volunteer client will be referred to with the 'Lavinia' pseudonym in terms of confidentiality. Initially, the volunteer did not mention a specific complaint. The interview proceeded with the questions asked in the natural flow. From the first minutes of the interview, a warm environment and therapeutic alliance were provided and Lavinia began to tell some experiences and thoughts. So, I could make some interpretations.

            The client had a well-groomed and clean appearance. During the conversation she used a confident tone of voice and had a straight body posture. Remarkably, she was opening and closing her eyes too much during the interview. She had big, beautiful eyes. Lavinia stated that she think the interviewing will be exciting for her. She seemed quite enthusiastic in the matter of psychology. She constructs a strong cooperation with me and seemed quite pleased throughout the interview. Moreover, I got the impression that she was striving to keep his speech constantly in the logical frame. She seemed to be in an unconscious insistence on feeling like it should or thinking as it should.

            The interview started with the question that is 'what motivated you to volunteer for this counselling?’. Upon this, the client introduced herself as a friendly, smoothly individual and who does not have a problem with communication. She opened a remarkable parenthesis to this statement with 'but' and emphasized that these features are not enough to establish particularly close relationships. Lavinia stated that she is in harmony, intimate with almost everyone within certain boundaries, but refrain herself from deeply friendship or emotional disclosure. She said, 'I have no one to call my best friend’ and indicated that when she compare herself with others, usually ask to herself or ask to people around her ‘Is it about a problem with me?’.  However, she added that this is a self-conscious choice rather than a problematic situation for her. In this point, when I consider the whole of our interviewing, she often looks the environment and sets some standards for herself as a result of these observations. She then tends to self-assess in the frame of those standards she identifies.

Therefore, it could be said that she is often inclined to self-evaluation. This tendency usually results in self-feedback under the relative circumstances. As a result, it seems that this attitude has become a habit, causing an increase in the level of self-awareness of Lavinia. On the other hand, high self-awareness probably brings with it self-critical thinking pattern. All these features will actually be gathered under a single headline, as evidenced by the progressive talks.

When I asked ‘how long this choice had lasted?’, she told a memory that corresponds to the last years of secondary school (ages 13-14). According to her, she was in a group of four close friends in the middle school. She is a best friend with particularly a girl who is in this group. But one day, while she talking to a girl from outside the group, she accidentally revealed special information about her closest friend. After this, her best friend ended her friendship by badly insulting her although she thinks that she deserves a second chance. She even asked people who were not very good with her, ‘Is she really unreliable person?’ Lavinia said she already knew herself, but confirmed it with this way. The need to receive feedback is also attract attention here. She feels herself hard done by her best friend. Ultimately, her experience seems to have profoundly influenced her general view of human relationships. What is noteworthy is that Lavinia, who is sure to never do the same 'mistake' again; she feared that other people could make the same mistake against her. So she prefers not to be 'the best' with anyone. Eventually, I said in a questioning way that ‘Then it seems to me that you do not give chance to other people now.’ After a while, she told me that she had never thought this situation like this before. After a bit of contemplation together on my interpretation, she defined her own attitude as self-guaranteeing. Because, when she behaved like this, she restrains herself to deep friendships, but she also protects herself from the possibility of betrayal.

Later, we talked about some girl and boyfriend experiences. To her, I directed the question that ‘has anyone else seen you her/his best friend before?’ and she answered with ‘Yes, there were few person.’ She talked about the intimate friendships during high school which generally result with disappointment. According to the conclusion that I got from all the memories she told, she actually came to the stage of a deep relationship with some girlfriends and also boyfriends during high school. But, I have observed that she has a tendency to negatively attribute some unimportant events that are experienced with her friends. While she was messing with a friend, her friend, who was messing with it, responded with a slightly strange message. This seems to be a powerful reason for Lavinia to label her friendship as questionable and even unfavourable. This is an good example of a her negatively attribution style, because Lavinia prefers to understand in such a way instead of associating with a bad day of her friend or something else that is not relevant to her.

I asked that ‘The same mistake you made against your best friend in middle school, how would you react if someone else would repeat it against you now?’ and I added ‘but like yours, in an unintentional way, without bad intentions.’ In brief, she said that if she had experienced such an event, she would not put an end to her friendship, but she definitely would always be more cautious. She emphasized too much cautiousness in her answer to this question. Although she expressed that she deserves a second chance, In fact, she gives the girl right who ends their friendship. I thought she blames herself for that situation in middle school and she perceives that this ended friendship as a just punishment in return for her mistake. Even, it has been almost five years since the event she talked about, her memory still seems to be really alive. Because implicit past perception of Lavinia like that, she act in the same way against the all friends in present time. In addition, when I said this interpretation to Lavinia during the interview, she also confirmed me. In other words, Lavinia, again sets standards for her friendships (does not matter romantic relationships or girlfriends), and the slightest perceived negative behaviour from counter party that could cause deviation from the standards. Finally, she feels big disappointment. Because of this, she also prefers self-guarantee attitudes in friendship relations.

I asked that ‘Should friendships be free from mistakes, or could people know each other by making some mistakes?’, In the face of this question, she radically protected her attitude and said that ‘Yes, there may be some mistakes. However, after these mistakes, you must be cautious.’ On the way, I got the impression that she had a tendency to think as black or white. She thought friendships, friends' personalities, or what they did should either completely good or completely bad.

The last and important question is that "Which times do you need the a best friend?", surprisingly, Lavinia react this question as ‘Wow, it is very good question.’. She told me two significant experiences. First is that she was very close to the explosion in March of 2016 in Guvenpark, Ankara. Second, she had attacked by drug addicts while traveling on a car between cities with his parents. Especially bad times, she said that she needed to share something with a peer even though she has very close relationship with her family. When she was in car travelling with her family at night, her father parked the car and went to the toilet. Lavinia and her mother slept on the car at that moment. It was interesting to me that she described this phenomenon as the mistake of sleeping in the car. She talked about the sleep problem in connection with these bad memories she had recently suffered. After these events, we built great consensus that she had a triggering role in his sleeping problem. Lavinia was felt some kind of obligation about had to be on the alert at every moment especially at nights because everybody was unguarded during sleep. When we were talking about the feeling of constant vigilance and the sleep problem, she declared that she checked everything at least three times while sleeping at night or when she was going out of the house. For example, on the list she controls, there are elements such as cooker, iron, electric sockets, door lock, and windows. She had his own opinion that this situation was related to his desire to guarantee something for himself. I think this situation may be related to the request to control everything basically. The inferences I have gained during our conversation with Lavinia seemed to be gathered under a single heading, which is perfectionism. As evidence for this generalization, much research has been done that reflects situation of Lavinia. Several behavioural patterns and particular cognitive dispositions about perfectionists were demonstrated in the literature. The following examples are appropriate to perception pattern of Lavinia that occur; overgeneralization, exaggeration of negativity and reduction of positivity, ignorance and magnification, emotional reasoning, morality, labelling and personalization (Barrow and Moore, 1983; Burns, 1980; Hamachek, 1978; Pacht, 1984).

As a summary, the 'best friend' problem, which the client first mentioned, defined the course of interview. In this framework, the concepts of reliability and mistakes in friendships were dealt. Then, in the light of some traumatic events, the client's sleep problem was talked. In relation to the whole of the opinion about interview that the client’s high self-awareness, self-feedback and self-assessment habit, request to control and black or white thinking pattern were stressed. Moreover, client’s negative attribution style, need of self-guarantee, and the desire of behaving according to certain standards and finally her perfectionist personality traits were also emphasized. Almost all comments were shared and agreed upon because the client regularly requested for feedback within the interview. At such moments, Lavinia has often gladly stated that she has obtained a new perspective for herself. She also mentioned a few topics that she told me for the first time during this conversation. Nevertheless, it is clear that the observations and inferences on this report probably bring distress for her. It should be understood that the client is voluntary for this interview; she is disturbed by these stress sources in her some part of the life and wants to solve them.

In addition to all this, when the client's daily life was examined, there was no pathological finding that could cause serious disruptions for her. She seems to be able to functionally manage her school and student-related tasks, which are important for her daily life flow. However, given that she has a social life other than a well-managed academic life. On this second side of life, she seems not personally very satisfied. As it would be appropriate for her situation, surveys have shown that perfectionist tendencies generally reduce individual productivity and self-satisfaction, and hinder the improvement of interpersonal relationships (Adderholt & Elliot, 1984; Burns, 1980). However, as already mentioned, in the case of Lavinia there is no specific pathological finding. So, treating her perfectionism as a kind of personality disorder would be a very wrong assessment. At this point, the notion of multidimensional perfectionism which takes up considerable space in the literature will help. Many personality theorists see certain dimensions of perfectionism as necessary and healthy for the individual. For example, Adler (1956), states that perfectionism is an innate motive and life is unimaginable without this effort. This view shows that perfectionism is healthy and undisturbed when it comes to the meaning of improving one's ability to maximize points. There are debates about whether it is pathological or not, struggling to high standards. As mentioned earlier, having too high, debilitating personal standards is accepted as the only specific feature of perfectionism. Furthermore, Hamachek (1978) specified two main perfectionism types that are normal and neurotic. Normal perfectionism means that putting high at the same time logical, accessible and possible standards. This harmless version even commented better for individuals without excessiveness. Because struggling with the full extent of power allows them to reach desired goals. However, neurotic perfectionism defined with fantastic or unachievable aims and standards. These types of people have a tendency for always criticize them.

At the end of the interview, Lavinia asked me for advice and interpretation. So, I asked her a final question. ‘If you are someone who is less anxious in the matter of social integrations, a little more relaxed, moves without thinking about what happens in the future and carries a less desire to self-guarantee; what kind of differences do you have in your life?’ She briefly said that she could be happier, with more deeply friends, more social activities. As a suggestion and comment, I told her that these attitudes could not be seen as a problem to be solved, and personal differences actually play a inclusionary role in this phenomena. But, she himself has some discomfort about these issues. Therefore, I suggested that she could try another way of life that is less cautious, less anxious, less standardized. I stated that every close relationship naturally carries some risks, but life is also the balance of this benefit-loss.

References:Adderholt-Elliott, M. (1989). Perfectionism & underachievement. Gifted Child Today Magazine, 12(1), 19-21.Adler, A. (1956). Striving for superiority. The individual psychology of Alfred Adler: A systematic presentation in selections from his writings, 101-125.Barrow, J. C., & Moore, C. A. (1983). Group interventions with perfectionistic thinking. Journal of Counseling & Development, 61(10), 612-615.Burns, D. D. (1980). The perfectionist’s script for self-defeat. Psychology today, 14(6), 34-52.Hamachek, D. E. (1978). Psychodynamics of normal and neurotic perfectionism. Psychology: A Journal of Human Behavior.Pacht, A. R. (1984). Reflections on perfection. American psychologist, 39(4), 386.