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NEW APPROACH TO INTERVIEWING CHILDREN: A TEST OF ITS EFFECTIVENESS

NCJ Number
144293
Journal
Polygraph Volume: 22 Issue: 2 Dated: (1993) Pages: 180-193
Author(s)
C B DeWitt
Date Published
1993
Length
14 pages
Annotation
The cognitive interview procedure has been used with child witnesses. The three phases of this procedure include developing a rapport between interviewer and child and setting ground rules for subsequent questioning, eliciting from the child as complete a narrative or report of the alleged crime as possible, and encouraging the child to clarify and expand upon what was reported in the narrative account.
Abstract
The approach was tested on 34 third-grade children and 58 sixth-grade children who witnessed two staged events and were interviewed about each. The deputies who interviewed the children conducted one of two types of target interview: cognitive or standard. The cognitive interviewers were instructed to use four techniques including reconstructing the circumstances, being complete, using backward-order recall, and having the children recall the event from another person's perspective. The results in terms of number of facts recalled correctly, number of recall errors, and accuracy of recall, indicate that cognitive interviewing significantly improves children's recall performance, particularly for sixth-graders. To be most effective, interviewers should use all four techniques at least once and should conduct a positive interview. 2 notes and 11 references

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