In cases involving the alleged sexual abuse of a child, the pre-polygraph investigation often depends entirely upon the forensic interview of the alleged child victim. Forensic interviews of children in sexual abuse cases have a long history of ineffectiveness resulting in irreparable harm to both the alleged victim and suspect. The Child Advocacy Center (CAC) was created with trained interviewers to balance the investigative needs of the police and prosecution. However, evidence emerged indicating that many forensic interviews of children were conducted in a nonobjective manner and lacked diagnostic validity. The intent of this article is to identify some of the more common sources of error associated with the forensic interviews of children, particularly allegations of sexual abuse, so that polygraph examiners and others involved in these cases can make assumptions and decisions that are reasonably sound and defensible. References