首页 | 本学科首页   官方微博 | 高级检索  
相似文献
 共查询到20条相似文献,搜索用时 31 毫秒
1.
2.
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.  相似文献   

3.
OBJECTIVE: The goal of the present study was to examine how children disclosed sexual abuse by alleged perpetrators who were not family members. METHODOLOGY: Thirty alleged victims of sexual abuse and their parents were interviewed. The children were interviewed using the NICHD Investigative Interview Protocol by six experienced youth investigators. The same principles were followed when the parents were asked to describe in detail what had happened since the abusive incidents. The statements made by the children and parents were then content analyzed. Major characteristics of the children's and parents' reported behaviors were identified by two independent raters. FINDINGS: More than half (53%) of the children delayed disclosure for between 1 week and 2 years, fewer than half first disclosed to their parents, and over 40% did not disclose spontaneously but did so only after they were prompted; 50% of the children reported feeling afraid or ashamed of their parents' responses, and their parents indeed tended to blame the children or act angrily. The disclosure process varied depending on the children's ages, the severity and frequency of abuse, the parents' expected reactions, the suspects' identities, and the strategies they had used to foster secrecy. CONCLUSIONS: The children's willingness to disclose abuse to their parents promptly and spontaneously decreased when they expected negative reactions, especially when the abuse was more serious. A strong correlation between predicted and actual parental reactions suggested that the children anticipated their parents' likely reactions very well.  相似文献   

4.
OBJECTIVE: To identify characteristics of suspected child abuse victims that are associated with disclosure and nondisclosure during formal investigations. METHODOLOGY: The database included all suspected cases of physical and sexual abuse investigated in the state of Israel between 1998 and 2002. All investigative interviews were conducted using a single standardized protocol, the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) Investigative Interview Protocol. FINDINGS: Overall, 65% of the 26,446 children made allegations when interviewed, but rates of disclosure were greater in the case of sexual (71%) than physical (61%) abuse. Children of all ages were less likely to disclose/allege abuse when a parent was the suspected perpetrator. Rates of disclosure/allegation increased as children grew older, with 50% of the 3- to 6-year-olds, 67% of the 7- to 10-year-olds, and 74% of the 11- to 14-year-olds disclosing abuse when questioned. CONCLUSIONS: Although most interviews of suspected victims yielded allegations, such rates of disclosure varied systematically depending on the nature of the alleged offences, the relationship between alleged victims and suspected perpetrators, and the age of the suspected victims. The findings obtained in this large and unselected data set confirm patterns previously reported in smaller and quite selective samples, most of them obtained in the United States.  相似文献   

5.
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.  相似文献   

6.
OBJECTIVE: To introduce and evaluate a structured interview protocol designed for investigative interviews of youthful alleged perpetrators of child sexual abuse. METHOD: Seventy-two alleged perpetrators ranging from 9 to 14 years of age (M = 12 years) were interviewed by 1 of 13 experienced youth investigators, employed by the Israeli Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs, about incidents that had been reported by alleged victims. All interviews were conducted as part of the investigators' regular work and followed the structured interview guide appended to this article. RESULTS: Interviewers questioned older and younger children similarly, but addressed fewer invitations, directive questions, and option-posing prompts to suspects who denied the allegations than to those who partially or fully admitted them. The total number of details provided by the suspects did not vary depending on their age or whether or not they fully or partially admitted the allegations. In both cases, more information was elicited using invitations rather than suggestive or option-posing prompts. CONCLUSION: Contrary to expectations, suspects who at least partially admitted their involvement provided considerable amounts of information and were very responsive to free recall prompts, although interviewers used more risky (potentially error-inducing) prompts when interviewing suspects rather than alleged victims.  相似文献   

7.
ObjectivesThe study was designed to assess the effectiveness of the flexibly structured NICHD Investigative Interview Protocol for child sexual abuse (CSA) investigative interviews by police officers and mental health workers in Quebec. The NICHD Protocol was designed to operationalize “best practice” guidelines and to help forensic interviewers use open-ended prompts to facilitate free recall by alleged victims.MethodA total of 83 interviews with 3- to 13-year-old alleged victims were matched with 83 interviews conducted by the same interviewers before they were trained to use the Protocol. Interviews were matched with respect to the children's ages, children–perpetrator relationships, and the types and frequency of abuse. Coders categorized each of the prompts used to elicit information about the abuse and tabulated the numbers of new forensically relevant details provided in each response.ResultsInterviewers used three times as many open-ended prompts in Protocol interviews than in non-Protocol interviews, whereas use of all other types of questions was halved, and the total number of questions asked decreased by 25%. Protocol-guided interviews yielded more details than comparison interviews. The mean number of details per prompt increased from 3 to 5 details when the Protocol was used. Even with young children, interviewers using the Protocol employed more invitations to elicit forensically relevant details.ConclusionsFrench-speaking investigators using the NICHD Protocol used open-ended prompts rather than focused questions when interviewing alleged victims. In addition, these interviewers needed fewer questions to get relevant information when using the Protocol.Practical implicationsA French version of the NICHD Protocol is now available to police officers and social workers who investigate the alleged sexual abuse of young children in French-speaking countries. This French version allowed trained interviewers to increase the use of invitations and reduce the use of more focused and risky questions. When the number of questions was controlled, more central details and more details in total were obtained in Protocol interviews, because the average prompt elicited more detailed answers in Protocol interviews. However, learning to use the NICHD Protocol required extended training and continued feedback sessions to maintain the high quality of interviewing.  相似文献   

8.
OBJECTIVE: The purpose was to explore the effects of victim/complainant and perpetrator/defendant gender on the impact of recovered memory testimony in criminal sexual abuse trials. METHOD: A jury simulation methodology was used. Two hundred forty-six participants read a summary of a sexual abuse trial in which the following three variables were manipulated: the complainant's gender, the defendant's gender, and whether the complainant's memory of the alleged abuse had been "recovered" or remembered all along. Participants reached a verdict and rated the culpability and credibility of the parties. RESULTS: Compared to a case where the memory of the abuse had always been remembered, recovered memory testimony led to lower perceptions of the defendant's culpability and higher perceptions of the defendant's credibility. In addition, the complainant with recovered memory was viewed as less credible and less likely to be telling the truth. These effects of testimony type (i.e., recovered vs. remembered) were qualified by an interaction with complainant and defendant gender, such that testimony type exerted an effect in cases of alleged heterosexual but not homosexual abuse. CONCLUSION: The results suggest that mock jurors' judgments in sexual abuse cases reflect their stereotypes about sexual abuse and expectations regarding the relative likelihood of repression in various circumstances.  相似文献   

9.
OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the effectiveness of a structured interview protocol (NICHD Investigative Interview Protocol) operationalizing universally recommended guidelines for forensic interviews. METHOD: The NICHD Investigative Protocol was designed to maximize the amount of information obtained using recall memory probes, which are likely to elicit more accurate information than recognition memory probes. Forensic investigators were trained to use the NICHD protocol while conducting feedback-monitored simulation interviews. The utility of the protocol was then evaluated by comparing 55 protocol interviews with 50 prior interviews by the same investigators, matched with respect to characteristics likely to affect the richness of the children's accounts. The comparison was based on an analysis of the investigators' utterance types, distribution, and timing, as well as quantitative and qualitative characteristics of the information produced. RESULTS: As predicted, protocol interviews contained more open-ended prompts overall as well as before the first option-posing utterance than non-protocol interviews did. More details were obtained using open-ended invitations and fewer were obtained using focused questions in protocol interviews than in non-protocol interviews, although the total number of details elicited did not differ significantly. In both conditions, older children provided more details than younger children did. CONCLUSION: The findings confirmed that implementation of professionally recommended practices affected the behavior of interviewers in both the pre-substantive and substantive phases of their interviews and enhanced the quality (i.e., likely accuracy) of information elicited from alleged victims.  相似文献   

10.
OBJECTIVES: To understand the features of child abuse/neglect (CA/N) allegations in cases with emotional maltreatment (EMT) allegations, as well as the features of the EMT allegations themselves, and to describe any associations of EMT with distinct impairments of children's behavior, emotion and functioning. METHOD: The sample consisted of 806 high-risk children, 545 with one or more maltreatment reports to CPS. The Maltreatment Classification System was used to record the number and severity levels of maltreatment allegations, which compared cases with and without EMT. Multiple regression analyses were conducted using 10 outcome scales from the Child Behavior Checklist, Vineland Screener, and Trauma Symptom Checklist. Successive blocks of predictor variables included demographics, maltreatment classification variables, maternal and family characteristics, and study site. RESULTS: When there were allegations of EMT as well as CA/N in a CPS case-record (by age 8), the CA/N allegations tended to be either more frequent or less severe than those kinds of allegations in cases without EMT. When neglect was alleged to occur with EMT, neglect allegations outnumbered allegations of EMT. However, when sexual abuse allegations were accompanied by EMT allegations, there were more EMT allegations than sexual abuse allegations in the cases. Higher severity ratings for EMT allegations than for physical abuse occurred when cases included any abuse. Distinctive effects of EMT subtypes were found between problems of safety/restriction and self-reported anger symptoms, and between problems of self-esteem/autonomy and posttraumatic stress. CONCLUSION: Differences exist between the CA/N allegations in cases with and without EMT. Having few cases containing only EMT allegations made it difficult to assess distinctive harm associated with EMT. Certain types of EMT allegations were associated with increases in children's anger and posttraumatic stress.  相似文献   

11.
OBJECTIVE: The goal of the present study was to investigate the consistency of children's reports of sexual and physical abuse. METHOD: A group of 222 children, ages 3-16 years, participated. As part of legal investigations, the children were interviewed twice about their alleged experiences of abuse. The consistency of children's reports of sexual and physical abuse was examined in the two interviews, in relation to age, type of abuse, gender, memory, suggestibility, and cognitive capabilities. RESULTS: Older children were more consistent than younger children in their reports of sexual and physical abuse. Children were more consistent when reporting sexual abuse than physical abuse. Girls were more consistent than boys in sexual abuse reports. Consistency in sexual abuse reports was predicted by measures of memory, whereas consistency in physical abuse reports was not. Cognitive abilities did not predict consistency in sexual abuse or physical abuse reports. CONCLUSIONS: Implications for understanding children's allegations of abuse are discussed.  相似文献   

12.
OBJECTIVE: The present study sought to identify characteristics of child sexual abuse cases which differentiate cases referred for criminal prosecution ("criminal-action") from those not referred ("dropped") by investigators. METHOD: The study sample consisted of 1043 children who completed a forensic interview for sexual abuse that allegedly occurred at the hands of an adult between January 1, 1993 and December 31, 1996 in Bernalillo County of New Mexico. Data was systematically obtained from forensic interview files and offender records at the local prosecutor's office. RESULTS: Differences between criminal-action and dropped cases were found in relation to the children (age, sex and ethnicity), the alleged offenders (age, sex and relationship to child), and the case characteristics (disclosure and injury to the child). CONCLUSIONS: The present study provided insight into the characteristics of a previously ignored population (reported child sexual abuse cases that are not referred for prosecution). Recommendations are made to address the needs of these children and their families.  相似文献   

13.
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.  相似文献   

14.
Using information from mail and telephone surveys and personal interviews with legal and mental health professionals who deal with child abuse cases, and empirical data from 12 domestic relations courts throughout the United States, the study concludes that only a small proportion of contested custody and visitation cases involve sexual abuse allegations. Records maintained by family court workers place the figure at less than 2%. A sample of 169 cases for which data were gathered from court counselors, family court, and CPS agency files also found that accusations were brought by mothers (67%) and fathers (28%) and third parties (11%). Fathers were accused in 51% of all cases, but allegations were also made against mothers, mothers' new partners, and extended family members. In the 129 cases for which a determination of the validity of the allegation was available, 50% were found to involve abuse, 33% were found to involve no abuse, and 17% resulted in an indeterminate ruling. Four factors were significantly associated with the perceived validity of the abuse report: age of the victim, frequency of the alleged abuse, prior abuse/neglect reports, and the amount of time elapsing between filing for divorce and the emergence of the allegation.  相似文献   

15.
OBJECTIVE: The purpose is to explore differences in confirmed, unconfirmed, and false allegations of abuse made by consumers with mental retardation in regards to type of abuse and perpetrator. METHOD: Interviews were conducted with 1,220 people with mental retardation who were part of a class action lawsuit in North Carolina. A content analysis of abuse allegations was performed. Frequencies of responses and subgroup differences are reported for type of abuse allegation and perpetrator. RESULTS: Unconfirmed claims are the most frequent. Females made more allegations of abuse than males in general, and more allegations of rape. There are no significant differences among the subgroups (confirmed, unconfirmed, and false allegations) by type of abuse allegation. There are significant differences among the subgroups in regard to the alleged perpetrator. Other consumers with mental retardation are most frequently accused of confirmed assaults. Staff members are most frequently accused in false allegations. CONCLUSION: Ability of the alleged victim to report information and timing of the investigation are important factors in substantiating abuse. Awareness of consumer-to-consumer violence and prevalence of false accusations against staff necessitates increased safeguards for both consumers and staff.  相似文献   

16.
OBJECTIVE: For successful prosecution of child sexual abuse, children are often required to provide reports about individual, alleged incidents. Although verbally or mentally rehearsing memory of an incident can strengthen memories, children's report of individual incidents can also be contaminated when they experience other events related to the individual incidents (e.g., informal interviews, dreams of the incident) and/or when they have similar, repeated experiences of an incident, as in cases of multiple abuse. METHOD: Research is reviewed on the positive and negative effects of these related experiences on the length, accuracy, and structure of children's reports of a particular incident. RESULTS: Children's memories of a particular incident can be strengthened when exposed to information that does not contradict what they have experienced, thus promoting accurate recall and resistance to false, suggestive influences. When the encountered information differs from children's experiences of the target incident, however, children can become confused between their experiences-they may remember the content but not the source of their experiences. CONCLUSIONS: We discuss the implications of this research for interviewing children in sexual abuse investigations and provide a set of research-based recommendations for investigative interviewers.  相似文献   

17.
A major challenge in cases of child sexual abuse (CSA) is determining the credibility of children's reports. Consequently cases may be misclassified as false or deemed ‘no judgment possible’. Based on a large national sample of reports of CSA made in Israel in 2014, the study examines child and event characteristics contributing to the probability that reports of abuse would be judged credible. National data files of all children aged 3–14, who were referred for investigation following suspected victimization of sexual abuse, and had disclosed sexual abuse, were analyzed. Cases were classified as either ‘credible’ or ‘no judgment possible’. The probability of reaching a ‘credible’ judgment was examined in relation to characteristics of the child (age, gender, cognitive delay, marital status of the parents,) and of the abusive event (abuse severity, frequency, perpetrator–victim relationship, perpetrator's use of grooming, and perpetrator's use of coercion), controlling for investigator's identity at the cluster level of the analysis. Of 1563 cases analyzed, 57.9% were assessed as credible. The most powerful predictors of a credible judgment were older age and absence of a cognitive delay. Reports of children to married parents, who experienced a single abusive event that involved perpetrator's use of grooming, were also more likely to be judged as credible. Rates of credible judgments found are lower than expected suggesting under-identification of truthful reports of CSA. In particular, those cases of severe and multiple abuse involving younger and cognitively delayed children are the ones with the lowest chances of being assessed as credible.  相似文献   

18.
OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the structure and informativeness of interviews with 4- to 13-year-old alleged victims of sexual abuse in Sweden. METHOD: Seventy-two alleged victims of sexual abuse were interviewed by six experienced officers from one police district in Sweden. Our evaluation focused on the structure of the interviews, the distribution and timing of the investigators' utterance types, and the quantity and quality of the information provided by the children. RESULTS: Content analysis revealed that the interviewers relied primarily on option-posing and suggestive questions--together, these comprised 53% of their utterances--when interviewing the alleged victims. As a result, most of the details (57%) obtained from the children were elicited by option-posing and suggestive utterances. Only 6% of the interviewers' utterances were open-ended invitations, and these elicited only 8% of the information obtained. CONCLUSION: The reliance on option-posing and suggestive prompts may have reduced the accuracy of the information obtained, thereby interfering with the investigations, and reducing the forensic admissibility of the children's statements. This suggests a continuing need in Sweden, as in other countries, for interview practices that enhance the quality of information provided by young victims.  相似文献   

19.
20.
Objective: For successful prosecution of child sexual abuse, children are often required to provide reports about individual, alleged incidents. Although verbally or mentally rehearsing memory of an incident can strengthen memories, children’s report of individual incidents can also be contaminated when they experience other events related to the individual incidents (e.g., informal interviews, dreams of the incident) and/or when they have similar, repeated experiences of an incident, as in cases of multiple abuse.Method: Research is reviewed on the positive and negative effects of these related experiences on the length, accuracy, and structure of children’s reports of a particular incident.Results: Children’s memories of a particular incident can be strengthened when exposed to information that does not contradict what they have experienced, thus promoting accurate recall and resistance to false, suggestive influences. When the encountered information differs from children’s experiences of the target incident, however, children can become confused between their experiences—they may remember the content but not the source of their experiences.Conclusions: We discuss the implications of this research for interviewing children in sexual abuse investigations and provide a set of research-based recommendations for investigative interviewers.  相似文献   

设为首页 | 免责声明 | 关于勤云 | 加入收藏

Copyright©北京勤云科技发展有限公司  京ICP备09084417号