Repeated Questions, Deception, and Children’s True and False Reports of Body Touch

Four- to 7-year-olds’ ability to answer repeated questions about body touch either honestly or dishonestly was examined. Children experienced a play event, during which one third of the children were touched innocuously. Two weeks later, they returned for a memory interview. Some children who had no...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Child maltreatment 2007-02, Vol.12 (1), p.60-67
Main Authors: Quas, Jodi A., Davis, Elizabeth L., Goodman, Gail S., Myers, John E. B.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Answers
Biological and medical sciences
Child
Child Abuse - statistics & numerical data
Child, Preschool
Children
Children & youth
Deception
Female
Humans
Interviews
Male
Medical sciences
Memory
Narration
Periodicity
Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry
Psychopathology. Psychiatry
Social Work
Suggestibility
Suggestion
Surveys and Questionnaires
Touch
Truth
Truth Disclosure
Victimology
Witnesses
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Summary:Four- to 7-year-olds’ ability to answer repeated questions about body touch either honestly or dishonestly was examined. Children experienced a play event, during which one third of the children were touched innocuously. Two weeks later, they returned for a memory interview. Some children who had not been touched were instructed to lie during the interview and say that they had been touched. Children so instructed were consistent in maintaining the lie but performed poorly when answering repeated questions unrelated to the lie. Children who were not touched and told the truth were accurate when answering repeated questions. Of note, children who had been touched and told the truth were the most inconsistent. Results call into question the common assumption that consistency is a useful indicator of veracity in children’s eyewitness accounts.
ISSN:1077-5595
1552-6119
DOI:10.1177/1077559506296141