Children's eyewitness memory: a comparison of two interviewing strategies as realized by forensic professionals

Individual Differences in Children's Suggestibility: An Updated Review

The present review is intended as an overview of our current understanding of how children's individual characteristics, in terms of demographic, cognitive, and psycho-social variables, may influence their susceptibility to suggestion. The goals are to revisit conceptual models of the mechanisms of suggestibility, to provide an updated practical guide for practitioners, and to make recommendations for future research. Results suggest that children with intellectual impairment and those with nascent language skills may be particularly vulnerable to suggestion. Further, memory for separate events, theory of mind, executive function, temperament, and social competence may not be related to suggestibility, whereas additional work is needed to clarify the potential contributions of knowledge, stress, mental health, parental elaborative style, and adverse experiences/maltreatment to children's suggestibility.

Investigating linguistic coherence relations in child sexual abuse: A comparison of PTSD and non-PTSD children

Background

Language is the most common way to communicate internal states and emotions into a narrative form. Studies on the use of language provide a useful understanding of how people process an event and interpret it.

Objective

The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of PTSD on the narrative coherence of children's reports of sexual abuse.

Participants and setting

Narrative coherence was analyzed within a group of 89 allegations of children (M = 10; range: 4–16), who were victims of sexual abuse. Thirty-seven children presented the symptoms for a diagnosis of PTSD.

Method

Linguistic Inquiry Word Count (LIWC) was employed and narrative coherence was analyzed through some linguistic markers (first-person singular pronouns, conjunctions, and cognitive words).

Results

Results illustrated the effects of PTSD on the narrative coherence, in terms of first-person singular pronouns, conjunctions, and cognitive processes. Indeed, compared with traumatic narratives of children without PTSD, traumatic narratives of children with PTSD contained a greater number of first-person singular pronouns (M_PTSD = 1.45 versus M_no-PTSD = 1.12) and a smaller number of conjunctions (M_PTSD = .37 versus M_non-PTSD = .67), cognitive (M_PTSD = 2.93 versus M_non-PTSD = 3.76) and insight words (M_PTSD = 2.29 versus M_non-PTSD = 3.09). Regression analyses were used to examine if age and PTSD were predictors of the narrative coherence, suggesting the effects of PTSD in predicting the use of the first-person singular pronouns and the conjunctions.

Conclusion

This study could underline the importance of considering the PTSD in legal testimony of children who have been sexually abused.

Parental Attachment and Children's Memory for Attachment-Relevant Stories

Despite evidence that parents' attachment is associated with children's memory, less is known about the mechanisms underlying this association or the contexts in which the association is most meaningful. The present study examined whether parents' attachment predicted children's memory for stories about attachment-related topics, whether the cohesiveness of children's stories mediated the association between attachment and memory, and whether the association varied by interview support at retrieval. Five- to 6-year-olds completed attachment-relevant stories while parents provided information about their romantic attachment. Children's stories were coded for cohesiveness. A week later, children's memory for their stories was tested by either a supportive or non-supportive interviewer. When the interview was non-supportive, greater parental avoidance was associated with poorer memory, whereas when the interview was supportive, greater parental avoidance was associated with fewer errors. Findings provide insight into the context under which parents' attachment is most influential in shaping children's memory.

Positive events protect children from causal false memories for scripted events

Adults produce fewer inferential false memories for scripted events when their conclusions are emotionally charged than when they are neutral, but it is not clear whether the same effect is also found in children. In the present study, we examined this issue in a sample of 132 children aged 6-12 years (mean 9 years, 3 months). Participants encoded photographs depicting six script-like events that had a positively, negatively, or a neutral valenced ending. Subsequently, true and false recognition memory of photographs related to the observed scripts was tested as a function of emotionality. Causal errors-a type of false memory thought to stem from inferential processes-were found to be affected by valence: children made fewer causal errors for positive than for neutral or negative events. Hypotheses are proposed on why adults were found protected against inferential false memories not only by positive (as for children) but also by negative endings when administered similar versions of the same paradigm.

[The effects of question types for introduction on substantive information provided by Japanese children in interviews]

The effects of two introductory styles on substantive information provided by Japanese children were investigated. Children aged 5–6 years (n = 42) and 7–8 years (n = 40) took a simulated physical examination. One week later, the participants were interviewed about the examination in a narrative introductory condition using open-ended questions, or a non-narrative introductory condition using directive and yes/no questions. Substantive information provided by the children in the two conditions was compared. Results indicated that in the narrative condition, the participants provided more accurate information about the examination in response to open-ended questions. Additionally, the 7–8 year-old children in the narrative condition provided a wider range of critical information. These findings suggest that an open-ended introductory style is effective in eliciting more accurate information from children, including preschoolers, and more varied information from school-age children.

When Parents Know Little about What Happened: Parent-guided Conversations, Stress, and Young Children's Eyewitness Memory

This study examined how 4- to 7-year-olds' memories for a stressor were influenced by conversations with a parent who had little knowledge of the target event, and the stress children experienced before, during, and after the event. Children (N = 43) watched a mildly stressful video before talking about it with a parent. Parents were asked to focus on either the children's feelings or the content of the video itself. A researcher interviewed the children about their memory following the conversation. Behavioral and physiological measures of children's stress were collected at multiple stages. Children recalled more inaccurate information with the parent than with the interviewer. Younger age and parent insecure attachment were associated with poorer memory. Manipulation of parents' emotion orientation did not predict memory, but individual differences in the talk did, although in different ways from what would be expected from research on conversations about shared events. Less stress (according to self-reported happiness and observed negative affect) before and after, but not during, the stressor was linked with better memory. Implications for children's memory in legal settings are discussed. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

The Emotional Child Witness Effect Survives Presentation Mode

The emotional witness effect - the phenomenon whereby people are affected by the emotional manner in which a witness presents testimony - constitutes a possible source of wrongful decisions in legal contexts. One stereotypical view of abused children is that they should be sad when talking about their experiences of maltreatment, whereas children may in fact express a variety of emotional expressions when talking about abusive events. This raises the question as to whether there is an optimal mode in which to present child victim testimony that could reduce the possible influence of displayed emotions. In the present study, mock police interviews were carried out with female child actors, role-playing the victims of physical abuse by their stepfather, telling the same story with four emotional expressions (neutral, sad, angry, or positive). Laypersons (N = 465) were presented with the interviews as transcripts with the emotional reactions of the child witness noted, audio recordings, or videotaped recordings. Participants then rated the credibility of the victim witness. Replicating previous results, the "sad" expression elicited the highest credibility ratings across all modes of presentations. Presentation mode affected ratings of credibility, with the transcript versions resulting in the highest ratings. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Memory for child sexual abuse information: simulated memory error and individual differences

Building on the simulated-amnesia work of Christianson and Bylin (Applied Cognitive Psychology, 13, 495-511, 1999), the present research introduces a new paradigm for the scientific study of memory of childhood sexual abuse information. In Session 1, participants mentally took the part of an abuse victim as they read an account of the sexual assault of a 7-year-old. After reading the narrative, participants were randomly assigned to one of four experimental conditions: They (1) rehearsed the story truthfully (truth group), (2) left out the abuse details of the story (omission group), (3) lied about the abuse details to indicate that no abuse had occurred (commission group), or (4) did not recall the story during Session 1 (no-rehearsal group). One week later, participants returned for Session 2 and were asked to truthfully recall the narrative. The results indicated that, relative to truthful recall, untruthful recall or no rehearsal at Session 1 adversely affected memory performance at Session 2. However, untruthful recall resulted in better memory than did no rehearsal. Moreover, gender, PTSD symptoms, depression, adult attachment, and sexual abuse history significantly predicted memory for the childhood sexual abuse scenario. Implications for theory and application are discussed.

Eye-closure increases children's memory accuracy for visual material

Research shows that closing the eyes during retrieval can help both adults and children to remember more about witnessed events. In this study, we investigated whether the eye-closure effect in children is explained by general cognitive load, modality-specific interference, or a combination. 120 children (60 female) aged between 8 and 11 years viewed a 5-min clip depicting a theft and were questioned about the event. During the cued-recall interview, children either viewed a blank screen (blank-screen condition), kept their eyes closed (eye-closure condition), were exposed to visual stimuli (visual-distraction condition), or were exposed to auditory stimuli (auditory-distraction condition). Children in the blank-screen and eye-closure conditions provided significantly more correct and fewer incorrect responses about visual details than children in the visual- and auditory-distraction conditions. No advantage was found for auditory details. These results support neither a pure cognitive-load explanation (in which the effect is expected to be observed for recall of both visual and auditory details), nor a pure modality-specific account (in which recall of visual details should only be disrupted by visual distractions). Practical implications of the findings are discussed.

Children's memories of removal: a test of attachment theory

We report a study of parents' attachment orientations and children's autobiographical memory for an experience that according to Bowlby's (1982) attachment theory should be particularly threatening-children's forced separation from their parents. It was hypothesized that individual differences in parents' attachment orientations would be associated with children's distress and memory for this highly traumatic event. Children (n = 28) were observed during forced removal from home or school by Child Protective Services due to allegations of child maltreatment. Children's memory for the removal was tested 1 week later, and biological parents (n = 28) completed an adult attachment measure. Parental attachment anxiety significantly predicted children's distress during less stressful phases of the removal, R(2) = .25, and parents' attachment-related avoidance predicted fewer correct memory reports from the children (i.e., fewer hits to open-ended questions, R(2) = .16, and fewer hits to direct questions, R(2) = .27). The findings indicate that attachment theory provides important guidance for understanding children's autobiographical memory for traumatic events.

Children's and adults' memory for emotional pictures: examining age-related patterns using the Developmental Affective Photo System

Two studies were conducted to examine theoretical questions about children's and adults' memory for emotional visual stimuli. In Study 1, 7- to 9-year-olds and adults (N=172) participated in the initial creation of the Developmental Affective Photo System (DAPS). Ratings of emotional valence, arousal, and complexity were obtained. In Study 2, DAPS pictures were presented to 20 8- to 12-year-olds and 30 adults, followed by a recognition memory test. Children and adults recognized aversive images better than neutral images. Moreover, children and adults recognized high and moderate arousal images more accurately than low arousal images. Adults' memory for neutral images exceeded that of children, but there were no developmental differences in memory for aversive pictures. Theoretical and methodological implications are discussed.

Autobiographical memory development from an attachment perspective: the special role of negative events

The authors propose a novel model of autobiographical memory development that features the fundamental role of attachment orientations and negative life events. In the model, it is proposed that early autobiographical memory derives in part from the need to express and remember negative experiences, a need that has adaptive value, and that attachment orientations create individual differences in children's recollections of negative experiences. Specifically, the role of attachment in the processing of negative information is discussed in regard to the mnemonic stages of encoding, storage, and retrieval. This model sheds light on several areas of contradictory data in the memory development literature, such as concerning earliest memories and children's and adults' memory/suggestibility for stressful events.