Differences between accounts provided by witnesses and alleged victims of child sexual abuse

Lawyers rapport building practices with child witnesses

BACKGROUND

Existing literature on rapport building in forensic interviews with children has primarily focused on police or social workers (Collins et al., 2002); overlooking the lawyer-child relationship.

OBJECTIVE

The present study was a novel exploration of the rapport building process between lawyers and child witnesses during the interview stage of a criminal proceeding.

PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING

A total of 67 Canadian lawyers (Mage = 41.69, SD = 11.19; 51 % female-identifying) with experience questioning child witnesses (i.e., under 18 years old) were surveyed on their rapport building with child witnesses.

METHODS

A self-report survey was used to assess how lawyers conceptualize and engage in rapport building with child witnesses.

RESULTS

Lawyers were found to perceive rapport building as an important element when working with child witnesses; however, the lawyers' self-reported rapport building techniques overlooked several important elements of rapport building identified in forensic interviewing literature. Overall, the role of the lawyer (i.e., prosecution or defence), but rarely gender, influenced their self-reported rapport building methods. Prosecution lawyers tended to report behaviors that were more aligned with creating an interpersonal connection during the rapport building phase with the child, such as creating an environment where the child feels safe and comfortable.

CONCLUSIONS

These findings provide insight into how lawyers conceptualize and engage in rapport building with child witnesses. Overall, the lawyers perceived rapport building as an important element with child witnesses, but only some of the techniques mentioned are considered best practices to build rapport with children.

Interviews of Children in a Portuguese Special Judicial Procedure

Since 2007, alleged victims of child sexual abuse in Portugal have provided evidence in a mandatory "Declarações para Memória Futura" (DMF; English transl. 'Statement for future use') proceeding. In order to protect children from having to testify in court, interviews conducted at the DMF can be used later as trial evidence because the hearings are conducted by judges. The present study examined 137 interviews with 3- to 17-year-olds conducted in several Portuguese criminal courts. Detailed examination of interview transcripts showed that 69% of all questions asked were option-posing questions, 16% were directive questions, 11% were suggestive questions, and only 3% were open-ended prompts. The vast majority of details provided by children were thus obtained using the risky recognition-based prompts (i.e., option posing and suggestive questions) associated with the risks of contaminating and limiting children's informativeness, both potential threats to the credibility of their testimony. There is an urgent need to address this issue and consider the implementation of a scientifically validated structured interview protocol in Portugal. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

A Response to "The Legacy of the Witch-Hunt Narrative"

The article provides an overview of and commentary on the last chapter of Cheit's book, The Witch-Hunt Narrative: Politics, Psychology and the Sexual Abuse of Children. The chapter is divided into two sections called "Recent Developments" and "The Legacy of the Witch-Hunt Narrative." We respond to the key assertions in each of those sections, providing discussion points of agreement and disagreement with Cheit, and note some areas Cheit does not cover, including important advances in the aftermath of the witch-hunt narrative (WHN). The article takes the position that there is cause for optimism with these advances in systems responses, child forensic interviewing research, and multidisciplinary team and training approaches; some of these advances are related to the WHN. The conclusion warns of the need to be vigilant about continuing Cheit's work, we suggest this could take place in six key areas: (a) enhanced teacher training, (b) improved court responses to child sexual abuse (CSA) victims, (c) expanded use of Extended Forensic Interviews so that the complex cases (children with disabilities, children from multi problem households) might be thoroughly considered for prosecution, (d) broadened focus on CSA validation, recovery, and prevention, (e) engaged multistate research on the actual occurrence of day care CSA allegations, and (f) expanded efforts to educate the public and potential jury pools about the nuances of CSA prosecution, and the illusion of toughness in how we respond to convicted offenders. Cheit's detailed research enables us to see where we came from, and what else needs to be done to understand the legacy of the WHN.

A structured forensic interview protocol improves the quality and informativeness of investigative interviews with children: a review of research using the NICHD Investigative Interview Protocol

OBJECTIVE

To show how the results of research on children's memory, communicative skills, social knowledge, and social tendencies can be translated into guidelines that improve the quality of forensic interviews of children.

METHOD

We review studies designed to evaluate children's capacities as witnesses, explain the development of the structured NICHD Investigative Interview Protocol, and discuss studies designed to assess whether use of the Protocol enhances the quality of investigative interviews.

RESULTS

Controlled studies have repeatedly shown that the quality of interviewing reliably and dramatically improves when interviewers employ the NICHD Protocol. No other technique has been proven to be similarly effective.

CONCLUSIONS

Use of the structured NICHD Protocol improves the quality of information obtained from alleged victims by investigators, thereby increasing the likelihood that interventions will be appropriate.

The effect of interviewing techniques on young children's responses to questions

BACKGROUND

Research into the effect of interviewing techniques has been predominantly within the paradigm of eyewitness testimony. This review focuses on the issues of questioning and examines whether children's responses are affected by questioning techniques, and whether these effects are generic to all interviewing contexts.

METHODS

Systematic literature searches were used to identify areas of concern and current findings in research on interviewing young children (aged 4-12).

RESULTS

The style and wording of questioning can affect children's responses and accuracy positively and negatively. These effects were especially apparent in interviews with the youngest children.

CONCLUSIONS

The implications of these findings are relevant in all contexts where an adult questions a child. It has been demonstrated that interviewing techniques can affect responses from children and that it is therefore imperative that interviewers are aware of, understand and control their influence in order to elicit complete, accurate and reliable information from the child.