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.

Young children's references to temporal attributes of allegedly experienced events in the course of forensic interviews

Developmental differences in references to temporal attributes of allegedly experienced events were examined in 250 forensic interviews of 4- to 10-year-old alleged victims of sexual abuse. Children's ages, the specific temporal attributes referenced, and the types of memory tapped by the interviewers' questions significantly affected the quantity and quality of temporal references produced. The findings documented age-related increases in 4- to 10-year-olds' references to temporal attributes, using the appropriate relational terminology, both spontaneously and in response to temporal requests. More references to temporal attributes were elicited from recall than from recognition memory, highlighting spontaneous reporting capabilities. Implications for theories concerning the developing understanding of temporal concepts and for the design of effective, age-appropriate, forensic interview techniques are discussed.

Can reinforcement induce children to falsely incriminate themselves?

This study examined whether reinforcement can induce children to falsely incriminate themselves. Ninety-nine children in kindergarten through third grade were questioned regarding the staged theft of a toy. Half received reinforcement for self-incriminating responses. Within 4 min reinforced children made 52% false admissions of guilty knowledge concerning the theft, and 30% false admissions of having witnessed it. Corresponding figures for controls were 36 and 10%. Twelve percent of children admitted to participating in the theft, but the effect of reinforcement was only marginally significant. The findings indicate that reinforcement can induce children to falsely implicate themselves in wrongdoing.

Dynamics of forensic interviews with suspected abuse victims who do not disclose abuse

OBJECTIVES

The present study was designed to explore structural differences between forensic interviews in which children made allegations and those in which children did not make allegations.

METHODOLOGY

Fifty forensic interviews of 4- to 13-year-old suspected victims of abuse who did not disclose abuse during the interview were compared with the same number of forensic interviews of alleged victims who made allegations of sexual or physical abuse. Only cases in which there was substantial reason to believe that abuse had taken place were included in the study. Audiotapes of the interviews were examined with a focus on interviewer utterances and children's responses during the pre-substantive rapport-building, episodic memory training, and 'getting the allegation' phases of the interviews, which all employed the NICHD Investigative Interview Guide.

FINDINGS

Forensic interviews which yielded allegations of child abuse were characterized by quite different dynamics than interviews with children who did not make allegations. When interviewing non-disclosers, interviewers made less frequent use of free recall prompts and offered fewer supportive comments than when interviewing children who made allegations of abuse. Children who did not disclose abuse were somewhat uncooperative, offered fewer details, and gave more uninformative responses, even at the very beginning of the interview, before the interviewers focused on substantive issues and before the interviewers themselves began to behave differently.

CONCLUSIONS

A premature focus on substantive issues may prevent children who are not responsive in the episodic memory training phase from disclosing abuse. Identifying reluctant disclosers and making more extensive efforts to build rapport before substantive issues are broached, or interviewing such children in more than one session, may help suspected victims disclose their experiences.

Suggestibility, social support, and memory for a novel experience in young children

This study examined 5- and 6-year-olds' suggestibility and interviewer demeanor as joint predictors of their memory for a novel experience. Session 1 consisted of children taking part in a novel laboratory event. Session 2 took place after approximately a 1-week delay and consisted of children completing both a memory test concerning what happened during the prior event and the Video Suggestibility Scale for Children (VSSC). During the second session, the interviewer behaved either supportively or nonsupportively. Greater acquiescence on the VSSC was associated with fewer correct responses to misleading questions about the laboratory event in the supportive and nonsupportive conditions and with more errors in response to specific questions in the nonsupportive condition. Results indicate that individual differences in children's suggestibility are related to the accuracy of their memory for separate events, although some of these relations may vary depending on the context in which children are interviewed.

Do jurors "know" what isn't so about child witnesses?

Are expert witnesses needed in child sexual abuse cases to educate jurors about children's memory, suggestibility, and reactions to abuse, or do jurors already know what such experts could tell them? To cast light on this question, we surveyed jurors and jury-eligible college students and compared their beliefs with what is known via scientific research regarding children's memory and ability to testify, reactions to interrogation, and reactions to sexual abuse. We also asked participants to infer results of four widely cited studies of children's suggestibility. Participants' beliefs were consistent with findings from research on some issues (e.g., that children can be led to claim that false events occurred) but diverged from the scientific consensus on other issues (e.g., whether children can remember painful events in infancy). Similarly, participants sometimes overestimated and sometimes underestimated the level of suggestibility observed in empirical studies. Individual differences in accuracy were related to participants' gender, education and ethnicity, and there was considerable disagreement among participants on many questions. Implications of findings for the admissibility of expert testimony in child abuse cases are discussed.

Criminal investigations of child abuse: the research behind "best practices"

This article reviews the research relevant to seven practices considered by many to be among the most progressive approaches to criminal child abuse investigations: multidisciplinary team investigations, trained child forensic interviewers, videotaped interviews, specialized forensic medical examiners, victim advocacy programs, improved access to mental health treatment for victims, and Children's Advocacy Centers (CACs). The review finds that despite the popularity of these practices, little outcome research is currently available documenting their success. However, preliminary research supports many of these practices or has influenced their development. Knowledge of this research can assist investigators and policy makers who want to improve the response to victims, understand the effectiveness of particular programs, or identify where assumptions about effectiveness are not empirically supported.

Wailing Babies in Her Wake

The scientific study of child witnesses has influenced both developmental science and jurisprudence concerning children. Focusing on the author's own studies, 4 categories of research are briefly reviewed: (a) children's eyewitness memory and suggestibility; (b) memory for traumatic events in childhood; (c) disclosure of child sexual abuse; and (d) experiences of child victim/witnesses within the legal system. Implications for psychology and for legal practice are discussed.

Using a human figure drawing to elicit information from alleged victims of child sexual abuse

Ninety 4- to 13-year-old alleged victims of sexual abuse were interviewed by police officers using the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) investigative interview protocol, following which they were shown a human figure drawing and asked a series of questions. The drawing and associated questions elicited an average of 86 new forensically relevant details. They were especially productive with 4- to 7-year-olds, who provided an average of 95 additional details (27% of their total) after the drawing was introduced despite having previously "exhausted" their memories. Information elicited using the drawing may be less accurate, however, because recognition memory prompts predominated, so such drawings should only be introduced late in investigative interviews.

Physiological reactivity, social support, and memory in early childhood

The interactive effects of physiological reactivity and social support on children's memory were examined. Four- to 6-year-olds completed a laboratory protocol during which autonomic responses and salivary cortisol were measured. Memory was assessed shortly afterward and 2 weeks later. During the second interview, children were questioned by a supportive or nonsupportive interviewer. Few significant relations emerged between reactivity and children's short-term memory. Following a 2-week delay, cortisol reactivity was associated with poorer memory and autonomic reactivity was associated with increased accuracy among children questioned in a supportive manner but decreased accuracy among children questioned in a nonsupportive manner. Results question traditional conceptualizations of reactivity as a risk factor and instead suggest that reactivity may only confer risk in certain environmental contexts.

A USA national survey of program services provided by child advocacy centers

OBJECTIVE

Child Advocacy Centers (CACs) are designed to improve the community collaborative response to child sexual abuse and the criminal justice processing of child sexual abuse cases. CACs, in existence for 16 years, now have standards for membership developed by the National Children's Alliance (NCA) that include nine core components. And yet no systematic examination of the CAC model exists. The purpose of this paper was to assess the variations within these core components as they exist in the field.

METHOD

Using a stratified random sampling design, 117 CAC directors were interviewed using a semi-structured interview that was based on the NCA's standards for membership. The eight core components of the CAC model examined in this study include: a child-friendly facility, a multidisciplinary team, an investigative child interview, a medical examination of the child, provision of mental health services, victim advocacy, case review, and case tracking.

RESULTS

Results reveal the CAC model has been widely adopted by both member and nonmember centers, although variations in implementation exist.

CONCLUSIONS

Future developments in the CAC model must include evaluation of the model.

Age differences in young children's responses to open-ended invitations in the course of forensic interviews

To elucidate age differences in responses to free-recall prompts (i.e., invitations and cued invitations) and focused recognition prompts (i.e., option-posing and suggestive utterances), the authors examined 130 forensic interviews of 4- to 8-year-old alleged victims of sexual abuse. There were age differences in the total number of details elicited as well as in the number of details elicited using each of the different types of prompts, especially invitations. More details were elicited from older than from younger children in response to all types of prompts, but there were no age differences in the proportion of details (about 50%) elicited using invitations. Cued invitations elicited 18% of the total details, and the number of details elicited using cued invitations increased with age. Action-based cues consistently elicited more details than other types of cues.

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

OBJECTIVES

To determine whether child witnesses of sexual abuse were more or less informative about the alleged incidents than alleged victims when interviewed similarly.

METHOD

Twenty-six alleged victims of child sexual abuse (aged 5 to 14 years; M=9.8 years) and 26 children who had witnessed but not experienced similar events were interviewed by experienced youth investigators about the alleged abuse. Children in the two groups were matched with respect to their age, relationships with the alleged perpetrator, and seriousness of the alleged offenses. All children were interviewed using the NICHD investigative interview protocol.

RESULTS

Witnesses and victims provided similar amounts of information about the incidents of abuse. Interviewers used more open-ended invitations and elicited more information using open-ended prompts from witnesses than from victims, whereas they used more risky (including suggestive) prompts when interviewing victims.

DISCUSSION

These results confirm that young children can be informative witnesses about events that they have either experienced or witnessed.

Reinstatement of 2-year-olds' event memory using photographs

This experiment examined 24- and 30-month-olds' understanding of photographs as reminders using a deferred imitation paradigm. The 24- and 30-month-olds visited a laboratory playroom and observed an experimenter demonstrating novel activities. Upon returning after a retention interval, half of the children viewed photographs depicting the activities they had viewed during their first visits as reminders of the event, as well as photographs of activities they had never seen. Children in both the reminder and the no-reminder groups were then asked to complete the originally modelled activities as a test of recall. Results indicate that although 30-month-olds recalled more activities than did 24-month-olds, children in the reminder condition at both ages recalled more activities than children in the no-reminder control condition. Results are discussed in terms of the development of representational understanding and long-term recall in young children.

Forensic evaluation of trauma syndromes in children

There are significant differences between a clinical evaluation and a forensic evaluation [289-291]. These differences must be kept solidly in mind in performing the evaluation. The forensic evaluator needs to assess the validity of complaints, including the possibility of malingering and the child's ability to describe symptoms accurately, the connection between the symptoms and a given incident, and the potential long-term sequelae of a trauma. The goal of the interview is not to treat, but to obtain information. Assessing the validity of complaints is perhaps the greatest challenge. This requires obtaining and reconciling data from numerous sources, including interviews with the child and parents, and information from other sources, as well as rating scales and validity testing. One must be very cautious in asking leading questions and using standardized PTSD protocols, lest they teach the parents and child about the symptoms of PTSD and thereby distort the information they provide as a result. The forensic interviewer should consider what will be needed when called to testify in court. What data will convince the jury? How might the opposing attorney challenge the assessment? What scientific studies support the findings and conclusions concerning the diagnosis, functional impairment, and validity. The precise DSM-IV-TR diagnosis is not always key in a forensic evaluation. What is essential is establishing the connection between the trauma and ensuing emotional problems. All of the symptoms the individual has as a result of the trauma become important, whether or not they contribute to fulfillment of DSM-IV-TR criteria. This contrasts with a clinical evaluation in which one needs to demonstrate the existence of a DSM-IV-TR diagnosis for reimbursement purposes. Finally, the forensic evaluator should be familiar with current practice guidelines for examination of children with PTSD. Any deviation may need to be explained in court [264,292].

Ethics and the forensic expert: a case study of child custody involving allegations of child sexual abuse

Psychologists who participate as forensic evaluators in custody and visitation cases involving allegations of child sexual abuse must possess advanced assessment skills and a thorough knowledge of child development, child sexual abuse, and child interviewing techniques. This case study illustrates the types of problems that are inevitable when psychologists violate the boundaries of their role as an independent evaluator and fail to uphold their ethical obligation to be knowledgeable and competent in the area in which they profess expertise.

Use of a structured investigative protocol enhances young children's responses to free-recall prompts in the course of forensic interviews

One hundred alleged victims of child sexual abuse (ages 4-12 years; M = 8.1 years) were interviewed by police investigators about their alleged experiences. Half of the children were interviewed using the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development's structured interview protocol, whereas the other children--matched with respect to their age, relationship with the alleged perpetrator, and seriousness of the alleged offenses--were interviewed using standard interview practices. Protocol-guided interviews elicited more information using open-ended prompts and less information using option-posing and suggestive questions than did standard interviews; there were no age differences in the amount of information provided in response to open-ended invitations. In 89% of the protocol interviews, children made their preliminary allegations in response to open-ended prompts, compared with 36% in the standard interviews.

A case study of child sexual false allegation

PURPOSE

The objectives of the case study reported in this article were twofold. The first objective was to follow the path by which a naive suggestion made in the course of a mother-child conversation was transformed into an allegation of severe sexual abuse. The second objective was to analyze the child's interview scientifically and explore the limitations of scientific tools for detecting implausible allegations.

METHODS

Independent case facts were collected and analyzed to determine whether the event described by the child was likely to have happened. The credibility of the child's account was assessed using Criterion-Based Content Analysis and the information provided in both the "implausible" and "corrected" statements was compared to quantify the fabricated details in the implausible statement.

RESULTS

The event described by the child was "very unlikely to have happened" but the credibility assessment failed to detect its implausibility. Comparison of the two statements revealed that the child did fabricate central details but incorporated them into a description of an event she really experienced, and most of the information provided was truthful.

CONCLUSIONS

The pressure to conform to suggestions can be irresistible, inducing some children to make false allegations of severe sexual abuse. Scientific tools designed for credibility assessment are limited and may fail to detect implausible statements especially when they incorporate information about genuinely experienced events.

The Memorandum of Good Practice: theory versus application

OBJECTIVE

The goal of this study was to evaluate the quality of investigative interviews in England and Wales since implementation of the Memorandum of Good Practice (MOGP), which specified how forensic interviews of alleged child abuse victims should be conducted.

METHOD

Transcripts of 119 videotaped interviews of alleged victims between the ages of 4 and 13 years were obtained from 13 collaborating police forces. Trained raters then classified the types of prompts used by the investigators to elicit substantive information from the children, and tabulated the number of forensically relevant details provided by the children in each response.

RESULTS

Like their counterparts in the United States, Israel, and Sweden, forensic interviewers in England and Wales relied heavily on option-posing prompts, seldom using open-ended utterances to elicit information from the children. Nearly 40% of the information obtained was elicited using option-posing and suggestive prompts, which are known to elicit less reliable information than open-ended prompts do.

CONCLUSION

Despite the clarity and specificity of the MOGP, its implementation appears to have had less effect on the practices of forensic interviewers in the field than was hoped. Further work should focus on ways of training interviewers to implement the superior practices endorsed by the MOGP and similar professional guidelines.

The role of accuracy motivation on children's and adults' event recall

To examine the role of accuracy motivation in event recall, 6-, 7-, and 8-year-old children and adults were shown a short video about a conflict between two groups of children. Three weeks later, participants were asked a set of unbiased specific questions about the video. Following A. Koriat and M. Goldsmith's (1994) distinction of quantity- and quality-oriented memory assessments, and based on their model of strategic regulation of memory accuracy (1996), accuracy motivation was manipulated across three conditions. Participants were (a) forced to provide an answer to each question (low accuracy motivation), (b) initially instructed to withhold uncertain answers by saying "I don't know" (medium accuracy motivation), or (c) rewarded for every single correct answer (high accuracy motivation). When motivation for accuracy was high, children as young as 6 were to withhold uncertain answers to the benefit of accuracy. The expected quality-quantity trade-off emerged only for peripheral items but not for the central items. Participants who were forced to provide an answer gave more correct answers but also high numbers of incorrect answers than participants who had the option to answer "I don't know." The results are discussed in terms of the underlying model as well as in terms of forensic interviewing.

How sexual abuse interviews go astray: implications for prosecutors, police, and child protection services

This article argues that child sexual abuse interviews can go astray in two different ways: (a) improper interviewing has the potential to elicit false allegations from children, and (b) clumsy interviewing does not typically produce false allegations, but may have other negative consequences, particularly for child victims. The article clarifies the distinction between the two kinds of bad interviewing and suggests that clumsy interviewing is the more common of the two. The potential negative consequences of both improper and clumsy interviewing are described, along with implications for prosecutors, police, and child protection services. In the authors' opinion, improper interviewing can probably be eliminated rather easily, but clumsy interviewing may be considerably more resistant to change.

Allegations of wrongdoing: the effects of reinforcement on children's mundane and fantastic claims

S. Garven, J. M. Wood, R. S. Malpass, and J. S. Shaw (1998) found that the interviewing techniques used in the McMartin Preschool case can induce preschool children to make false allegations of wrong doing against a classroom visitor. In this study, 2 specific components of the McMartin interviews, reinforcement and cowitness information, were examined more closely in interviews of 120 children, ages 5 to 7 years. Children who received reinforcement made 35% false allegations against a classroom visitor, compared with 12% made by controls. When questioned about "fantastic" events (e.g., being taken from school in a helicopter), children receiving reinforcement made 52% false allegations, compared with 5% made by controls. In a second interview, children repeated the allegations even when reinforcement had been discontinued. The findings indicate that reinforcement can swiftly induce children to make persistent false allegations of wrong doing.

Der Einfluß von Metakognitionen und vorheriger Irreführung auf die Identifikationsleistung kindlicher Augenzeugen1 1 Wir bedanken uns bei den Mitgliedern der DFG-finanzierten Forschergruppe “Kognitive Entwicklung” für ihre Unterstützung und die hilfreichen Kommentare

Zusammenfassung. Das Ziel der vorliegenden Studie war es, die Rolle metakognitiver Überwachungsprozesse in dem angewandten Kontext einer Identifikationsaufgabe zu überprüfen. Dazu wurde Vorschülern, Zweitkläßlern und Erwachsenen ein kurzer Videofilm über einen Konflikt zwischen Kindern vorgeführt. Drei Wochen später wurden der Hälfte der Versuchspersonen irreführende Distraktoren vorgelegt. Vier Wochen nach der Videodemonstration wurde die Identifikationsaufgabe, bei der die sieben Gesichter der beteiligten Kinder aus dem Film unter Distraktoren wiederzuerkennen waren, in zwei verschiedenen Versionen (sequentielle und simultane Darbietung der Photos) durchgeführt. Zur Erfassung metakognitiver Kompetenzen wurden Sicherheitsurteile zu den Identifikationen erhoben. Die Auswertung der Wiedererkennungsleistungen ergab insgesamt keinen klaren Alterstrend: bessere Identifikationsraten der Erwachsenen im Vergleich zu den Kindern ließen sich lediglich bei sequentieller, nicht aber bei simultaner Darbietung der Photos finden. Dabei waren in allen Altersgruppen negative Effekte der vorangegangenen Irreführung nachweisbar. In bezug auf die Sicherheitsurteile konnte festgestellt werden, daß sich die Kinder sowohl bei korrekten als auch bei falschen Identifikationen sicherer waren als die Erwachsenen und somit Schwierigkeiten hatten, die Sicherheit ihrer Erinnerung adäqaut einzuschätzen. Damit konnten Befunde aus der Grundlagenforschung zum prozeduralen Metagedächtnis bestätigt und deren Relevanz in einem angewandten Kontext aufgezeigt werden.

Memory strength affects reporting of misinformation

A model of long-term retention was used to examine whether and how the strength of original information (differences in learning and testing time) and the strength of misleading information (differences in timing and frequency) influence 3- to 5-year-olds' memory for an event. In three experiments, preschoolers viewed a slide presentation depicting an event, some of them were asked misleading questions, and memory for event details was tested. There was little evidence of memory impairment, but exposure to misleading information encouraged reporting of this information. Differences in learning influenced reporting in that children exposed to the event once reported more misled details than those who saw the event multiple times. Furthermore, preschoolers who saw the event once were just as susceptible to misleading information whether exposed to misinformation once or three times; however, preschoolers who had seen the event multiple times were susceptible only to repeated presentations of misinformation. Given that the reporting of misinformation is determined by the degree of integrity of both the original and misleading information, it is important to control for differences in trace strength for both types of information in future research.