Sunday, September 20, 2009

Classic Case of Answering a Question with a Question



Fox News' Jesse Watters speaks to ThinkProgress about his Ambush Interviews.

My first thought was this was a worthless piece of unprofessional interview footage... but then I'm thinking here is a guy who makes his living getting other people to answer questions when they do not want to; he must have some tricks up his sleeve and has learned a few things over the years, and he has.

Notice how he doesn't directly answer the questions. "Called her office twice" is not her directly refusing to appear on the show...

Questions answered with a question- means it is a sensitive question and the person may be stalling for time to come up with an answer.

He effectively stalled for three minutes, what he did correctly:
- Unemotional.
- Friendly.
- Appeared to want to answer the questions (even though he didn't).
- Never overacted, when he asked can you repeat the question, neutral.
Because he did all these things he appeared professional.

It still doesn't have any journalistic qualities but it is interesting to view from a interviewing technique perspective.◦
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