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The research interview is known to be a co-construction of meaning between interviewer and interviewee. The article seeks to understand the conditions in which this co-construction functions as a dual discovery: for the interviewee brought to explore their experiences, and for the researcher who is seeking to understand a social fact. The comparison of two excerpts of interaction highlights the conditions which help or hinder the process of discovery. On the researcher's side, there are responses which throw light on the interviewee's experiences at various levels, the ability to avoid subordinating the interview to preconceptions inherent in the research, the quality of responses which preserve the interviewee's defensive system. On the interviewee's side, there is a desire to explore life experiences, responsive understanding of the researcher's needs, dialogic integration of offers of meaning from the researcher and their use as an exploratory tool. All the foregoing elements weigh on the working partnership and are perceptible in the language used (argumentative shifts in discourse, dialogism, meta-discursivity, etc.). Incidentally, the article also highlights the peculiarity of the research interview's exploratory dynamics, in a psychosociological perspective.