Planning on doing cognitive interviews? Reflections and recommendations from the #So.Me study
Abstract
The use of cognitive interviewing (CI) is a widely recognised step in measurement development, helping researchers identify potential comprehension and interpretation problems and improve the content and face validity of measure items. However, existing best practice guidelines currently lack detail on how the CI process unfolds in practice, particularly in more complex or specialised research applications, limiting the ability of research teams to adequately prepare to undertake CI studies successfully. Based on our experiences of CIs to develop and refine a social media and mental health measure for adolescents, we offer four reflections on the process: (1) Cognitive interviews are resource intensive by design; (2) Conducting cognitive interviews is cognitively demanding; (3) You might not be able to test all the items you plan to; and (4) Flexibility in how you approach the item-test cycle might be necessary. These reflections are accompanied by a series of recommendations that offer practical strategies for conducting CIs and approaches to thinking laterally through the data analysis process. These recommendations are designed to complement and build on existing CI guidelines, and support future research teams planning CIs to undertake them more efficiently and effectively, especially in complex health measurement contexts.
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BibTeX
@misc{dunne2026planning,
title = {{Planning on doing cognitive interviews? Reflections and recommendations from the #So.Me study}},
author = {Jo Hickman Dunne and Lauren Burke and Jade Davies and Louise Black and Frederick Jones and Molly Anderton and Pratyasha Nanda and Felicitas Beissel and Reihaneh Farzinnia and Margarita Panayiotou},
howpublished = {PsyArXiv},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.31234/osf.io/8xv2c_v1},
url = {https://osf.io/preprints/psyarxiv/8xv2c_v1/},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Planning on doing cognitive interviews? Reflections and recommendations from the #So.Me study
AU - Jo Hickman Dunne
AU - Lauren Burke
AU - Jade Davies
AU - Louise Black
AU - Frederick Jones
AU - Molly Anderton
AU - Pratyasha Nanda
AU - Felicitas Beissel
AU - Reihaneh Farzinnia
AU - Margarita Panayiotou
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/10
PB - PsyArXiv
DO - 10.31234/osf.io/8xv2c_v1
UR - https://osf.io/preprints/psyarxiv/8xv2c_v1/
AB - The use of cognitive interviewing (CI) is a widely recognised step in measurement development, helping researchers identify potential comprehension and interpretation problems and improve the content and face validity of measure items. However, existing best practice guidelines currently lack detail on how the CI process unfolds in practice, particularly in more complex or specialised research applications, limiting the ability of research teams to adequately prepare to undertake CI studies successfully. Based on our experiences of CIs to develop and refine a social media and mental health measure for adolescents, we offer four reflections on the process: (1) Cognitive interviews are resource intensive by design; (2) Conducting cognitive interviews is cognitively demanding; (3) You might not be able to test all the items you plan to; and (4) Flexibility in how you approach the item-test cycle might be necessary. These reflections are accompanied by a series of recommendations that offer practical strategies for conducting CIs and approaches to thinking laterally through the data analysis process. These recommendations are designed to complement and build on existing CI guidelines, and support future research teams planning CIs to undertake them more efficiently and effectively, especially in complex health measurement contexts.
ER -