Our contribution on the subject of interviewer variability is made in the spirit of the opening quotation made and endorsed by two leading authorities in the field: conscious that we can add only a small part to the fabric of knowledge, but conscious, too, that every contribution is of value which throws light on the crucial interface between interviewer and respondent. In fact, a review of the literature reveals interviewer variability to be a more shadowy, more elusive subject than one would expect, with the very existence of the phenomenon open to doubt.
The author is responsible for marketing research courses which form part of Marketing degree and other courses in the University of Strathclyde at Glasgow in the U.K. The objectives of these research courses have to be decided in the light of the probable career patterns of undergraduate and postgraduate students, together with the limits and advantages of an academic course. The paper discusses these limits and advantages, then the needs of marketing enterprises in general. Discussion of individual topics in the subjects follows. A complication is the needs of the specialist marketing research 'producer' organization, and the need of the marketing organization to maintain an interface with these specialists. Examples are given of the practice and aspirations of the Strathclyde courses.