The effect of interviewing techniques on young children's responses to questions

Background  Research into the effect of interviewing techniques has been predominantly within the paradigm of eyewitness testimony. This review focuses on the issues of questioning and examines whether children's responses are affected by questioning techniques, and whether these effects are ge...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Child : care, health & development health & development, 2006-05, Vol.32 (3), p.321-331
Main Authors: Krähenbühl, S., Blades, M.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Accuracy
Adult
Age differences
Age Factors
Child
Child Behavior
Child Development
Child, Preschool
Children & youth
children's recall
Communication
Data collection
Developmental psychology
eyewitness testimony
Feedback (Response)
Humans
Interpersonal Relations
Interviewing
interviewing protocol
Interviews
Interviews as Topic - methods
Jurisprudence
Literature reviews
Memorization
Memory
Mental Recall
Police
Psychology, Child
question format
question repetition
Questioning
Questions
Recall (Psychology)
Researchers
Resistance (Psychology)
Responses
Suggestion
Terminology as Topic
Thinking Skills
Time Factors
Video Technology
Witnesses
Young Children
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Summary:Background  Research into the effect of interviewing techniques has been predominantly within the paradigm of eyewitness testimony. This review focuses on the issues of questioning and examines whether children's responses are affected by questioning techniques, and whether these effects are generic to all interviewing contexts. Methods  Systematic literature searches were used to identify areas of concern and current findings in research on interviewing young children (aged 4–12). Results  The style and wording of questioning can affect children's responses and accuracy positively and negatively. These effects were especially apparent in interviews with the youngest children. Conclusions  The implications of these findings are relevant in all contexts where an adult questions a child. It has been demonstrated that interviewing techniques can affect responses from children and that it is therefore imperative that interviewers are aware of, understand and control their influence in order to elicit complete, accurate and reliable information from the child.
ISSN:0305-1862
1365-2214
DOI:10.1111/j.1365-2214.2006.00608.x