Evaluating Qualitative Research in Social Geography: Establishing ‘Rigour’ in Interview Analysis

A review of 31 empirical and eighteen substantive papers by qualitative social geographers mainly using in‐depth interviews reveals little explicit reference to the principle(s) adopted to enhance ‘rigour’ and to ensure meaningful inference. Given the modest explicit discussion of evaluative criteria in these papers, a scheme from evaluation research itself is critically reviewed. A set of evaluation questions derived from this review and their application to an empirical piece of qualitative work frame an argument for a general set of criteria rather than rigid rules for assessing qualitative work. Such criteria can serve as anchor points for qualitative evaluation.