How to know who said what in a focus group
To know for certain who said each sentence in an in-person focus group you need three things: one microphone per person, a camera that sees the whole table and synchronizes every track, and a human review that leaves as a doubt whatever the machine cannot decide. A single room microphone is not enough, even with software that separates voices.
Why it matters
A qualitative study compares segments: customers against non-customers, younger against older people. If a sentence is attributed to the wrong person, a finding can switch segments without anyone noticing. And one misplaced quote is enough for the board to doubt the whole report.
Why a room microphone is not enough
Around a table, every microphone picks up everyone. In a real focus group we measured that the owner of a microphone was the loudest voice on her own microphone only 11 of 120 seconds. Voice separation software groups voices by timbre, but it does not know who each voice belongs to, and it gets confused when two people talk at once, which in a group is all the time. In a report built by hand from a single room microphone, only 1 in 10 quoted people was attributed.
The methods, from weakest to strongest
| Method | What it solves | Where it fails |
|---|---|---|
| An observer's notes | General ideas | Quotes from memory, not literal |
| Video and manual transcription | Literal quotes | Weeks of work; who is speaking is guessed from the image |
| Room microphone and automatic voice separation | Speed | Overlapping voices and neighbors; it does not know names |
| One microphone per person, 360 camera and review | Who speaks, when and what they said | Needs room preparation and synchronization |
How WR3 does it
- Synchronizes every microphone with the 360 camera's audio, which acts as the clock for the whole table.
- Separates who is speaking at each moment by comparing the microphones with each other. In our measurements, the result agrees with human review 90.4% of the time.
- Leaves as a doubt whatever it cannot decide, instead of guessing. A person reviews each doubt by listening to the recording.
- Checks every quote word for word against the transcript before it goes into the report, with the speaker's profile and the exact minute.
The principle behind it is simple: the worst error is the silent one. A doubt is always better than a guess.