# Summarising User Interviews Without Losing The Quotes

> Every theme has to carry the verbatim line that produced it.

- **Author:** [Mei Lin (@mei_lin)](https://www.promptabide.com/mei_lin)
- **Published:** 2026-07-06
- **Updated:** 2026-08-22
- **Tags:** `product`, `research`, `ux`, `writing`
- **Views:** 8109
- **Likes:** 419

## Prompt

```
The problem with summarised research is that it launders specificity into consensus. "Users want better onboarding" is not something any user said.

Constraint that fixes it:

"Summarise these 9 interview transcripts.

Rules:
- Every theme must include at least two verbatim quotes with the participant ID
- Count how many participants each theme came from; do not write 'users' for something two people said
- Keep contradictions as contradictions — do not average them into a middle position
- List anything mentioned exactly once separately, under 'signal or noise'
- Do not include recommendations"

The contradictions rule matters most. Two users wanting opposite things is real information about a segment split. Averaged into one bland statement it becomes a feature that satisfies neither of them.

Banning recommendations keeps the summary a summary. I want to read the evidence before someone tells me what to do about it.
```

## Output

*Produced by Claude · claude-opus-4.*

```
**Theme: publishing feels irreversible** (4 of 9)
- P2: "I wrote it, then just sat there. I didn't know if I could take it down."
- P7: "I posted to a private one first to see what it looked like."

**Contradiction: notification volume** (3 vs 2)
- P1, P4, P8 want per-comment notifications. P3: "I muted the whole thing in a week."
```

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