I am shortlisted for one pre-funded project and will take the interview early next week. Any inputs re what sort of questions will be asked? I don't think they'll ask me academic-oriented things as this is a well set-up topic and doesn't require too much prior knowledge of the field. So will questions I encountered in job interviews resurface, i.e. why do you want the post, what you can offer, what are your strengths and weaknesses, describe a situation when(blah, blah, blah).... and other wacky questions as well.

I had seven interviews before getting my post, and they've tended to be quite different, but in general the main questions tended to be usual interview sorts:
- why do you want to do a phd?
- what attracted you to this particular phd?
- what skills have you gained in the past that would help you?
- what have you been doing over the past year/few years?
- tell us about a piece of research you have done?

They also asked a few questions about the topic, but these been quite general:
- what do you know about the topic?
- what background reading have you done?
and maybe one specific question about methods or statistics.
Good luck with the interview, best thing to do is try not to worry. In the interview I got they asked me a specific question about the topic which I didn't know, so i told them I'd been doing reading on other parts of the topic and they let me talk about that instead!

Hey there - all great advice. I'll just add one of my little tips - take the advert for the PhD & underline each of the things they're looking for in a PhD student e.g. lab experience, ability to deal with quantitative methods, etc. then find something from your cv/experience that matches that. If there are some of the skills they're asking for that you don't have, give an example where you've been a quick learner & show that you can adapt easily from your previous experiences. Write down all your skills you think would be useful, and if they don't ask about them, raise them yourself... 'did you know that I could do this?'. Do read around a little, it's good to be able to show that you have made the effort to find out that bit more about the PhD. Good luck

If social sciences, they will want to know about research skills. What skills did you learn on your course, did you use them in an item of university work or in industry.

They will ask you about the topic. They will question the assumptions of the topic, they will ask you if you think they are 'true' or 'good' etc....to see if you can reason critically. They will want to know your views on the topic. Make sure you have read plenty of relevant papers beforehand. Also this will give you confidence.

Try and get a copy of the proposal, don't just go on the job advert as they can be really vague. Find out if you can what 'type' of person they are looking (if not totally clear from the advert) before the interview. This will help you to have a good think beforehand about how to demonstrate in interview that you are the person they want.

Also find out totally how they/you invisage the project being carried out, how tests will be done etc on whom, how many, how.

For most of the routine questions, I've answered and exemplified them in the personal statement with the application, if I get asked again, do I reiterate them and give the same eg.?