An Experimental Analysis of Children’s Ability to Provide a False Report about a Crime

The overall goal of this study is to provide an ecologically valid method for evaluating children’s true and false testimonies in an experimental setting. This method can answer key questions in the forensic psychology field such as how and why children produce false reports about crimes they witness. The main advantage of this technique is that it can produce generalizable information about child testimonies, as participants will witness a high-cost event before telling different true and false reports when being questioned using an empirically supported interview structure.

Begin by placing the necessary materials for the filler activities in the testing room. Put 20 and fake identification cards such as an old bus pass inside a wallet to give the participant the impression that the wallet belongs to someone else. Then, hide the wallet in a concealed location in the testing room, such as behind a flower pot on a table.

Place a jacket near the wallet to be retrieved by the instigator immediately prior to the theft situation. Put a testing in progress sign on the door of the testing room to avoid disturbances. Assign each child participant to one of four experimental conditions.

For the false denial condition, take the money from the wallet, but ask the children to falsely deny the theft to the interviewer by saying that the instigator did not take the money. For the false accusation condition, have children witness the instigator leave the money in the wallet, but ask them to tell a lie to the interviewer by falsely accusing the instigator of taking the money. For the true denial condition, do not take the money from the wallet and ask the children to truthfully deny the theft to the interviewer.

Lastly, for the true accusation condition, have the child witness the instigator take the money from the wallet and ask them to truthfully accuse the instigator of taking the money. Next, bring the legal guardians of the child into a common room, and ask them to complete a consent form that explains the procedures and purpose of the research. After the guardians have completed the paperwork, escort the child participant to the testing room.

In the testing room, inform the child that they will engage in some games and that they are free to stop the study at any time if they feel uncomfortable or upset. After the child provides verbal assent that they understand the instructions of the study, begin the filler activities in order to help build rapport between the instigator and the child, as well as to disguise the true nature of the study. After completing the filler activities, have the instigator grab their jacket before going with the child to the interview room.

Locate the wallet behind the flower pot on the table. Open the wallet and notify the child that the wallet belongs to another researcher. Remove 20 dollars from the wallet and depending on the condition the child is placed in, either take the money or place it back in the wallet.

Then, place the wallet back in its original position. Leave the jacket in the testing room and take the child to the interview room. Use an interview room that has a table with two chairs facing each other.

In this room, have the interviewer greet the instigator and the child. After the instigator introduces the child to the interviewer, have the instigator state that they forgot their jacket in the testing room. At this time, the interviewer indicates that they forgot their clipboard with the interview questions in the same room as well.

Right before the instigator leaves the room, have them instruct the child to complete a filler activity, while both the interviewer and the instigator go to the testing room to get the questions. After two minutes, have the instigator return to the interview room without the interviewer. During this time, ask the child to tell a truth or a lie about the wallet situation based on one of the four experimental conditions that the child has previously been placed in.

Then, have the instigator leave the room. Finally, one minute after the instigator leaves the room, instruct the interviewer to return and interview the child about the events with the instigator. Begin the interview with two baseline questions, in order to build rapport between the interviewer and the child as well as to provide baseline data regarding each child’s verbal ability to disclose information.

Ask one free recall question immediately after the baseline questions. The second free recall question should be asked at the end of the interview. Then, ask the child to describe everything they remembered from their time with the instigator, but in reverse order.

Finally, after completing the interview, bring the child into the common room. Have the instigator and the interviewer debrief the child about the deceptive nature of the study and tell them that the theft was pretend and did not actually occur. Children are more willing to tell a lie in the lie telling conditions compared to the truth conditions in which children’s ability to maintain the lies improves significantly with age.

The present study utilized an interview structure that encouraged detailed disclosures by using free recall questions and a reverse order question. Although children provided the longest disclosure with the most event details on the first free recall question, the reverse order and second free recall questions encouraged children to provide longer responses and more specific event details about the alleged theft. Once mastered, this technique can be done in 90 to 120 minutes if it’s performed properly.

While attempting this procedure, it’s important to remember that even though children will experience a high-cost event that may cause some discomfort, the current paradigm is not designed to cause serious distress that corresponds to real-life situations children testify about. Following this procedure, researchers can make modifications to the paradigm, such as questionnaires or debrief interviews at the end of the study to better understand children’s reasoning for their behaviors during the study as well as their reflections on the interview process. After watching this video, you should have a good understanding of how to design and implement a generalizable experimental study that is designed to investigate how and why children produce false disclosures in investigative interviews.