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- Ask, Karl, 1978
(author)
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Complainant emotional expressions and perceived credibility: Exploring the role of perceivers’ facial mimicry and empathy
- 2018
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In: Legal and Criminological Psychology. - : Wiley. - 1355-3259. ; 23:2, s. 252-264
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Purpose This research investigated the roles of perceivers’ facial mimicry and empathy in the emotional victim effect (EVE) – the finding that complainants tend to appear more credible when exhibiting (vs. not exhibiting) negative emotional displays during their statements. Because facial mimicry plays a key role in empathic responding, it was hypothesized that inhibiting and facilitating perceivers’ mimicry would attenuate and amplify the EVE, respectively. Methods Participants (N = 362) in an experiment were instructed to mimic or not to mimic facial expressions (controls received no mimicry instructions) while watching a statement by an emotional or non‐emotional rape complainant. Participants rated the complainant's believability and the extent to which they experienced cognitive and affective empathy. Results The perceived believability of the complainant was not affected by complainant emotions, thus failing to replicate the EVE. However, the inhibition of mimicry unexpectedly reduced the perceived believability of the complainant, apparently by decreasing participants’ cognitive empathy. Conclusions The current findings suggest that mimicry inhibition may increase scepticism in the context of credibility assessment. This has important implications for decision‐making in legal settings and for research on the process of credibility attribution. Moreover, the failure to replicate the EVE adds to the cumulative evidence on the underlying effect size for the phenomenon.
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| 2. |
- Deeb, Haneen, 1984, et al.
(author)
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The Devil’s Advocate approach: An interview technique for assessing consistency among deceptive and truth-telling pairs of suspects
- 2018
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In: Legal and Criminological Psychology. - : Wiley. - 1355-3259. ; 23:1, s. 37-52
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Purpose The aim of this study was to assess statement consistency in pairs of deceptive and truth-telling suspects when the Devil's Advocate approach is implemented. This approach involves asking suspects an ‘opinion-eliciting’ question for arguments that support their opinions followed by a ‘devil's advocate’ question to elicit opposing arguments. On the basis of the confirmation bias and impression management literatures, we predicted that truth-telling pairs would provide more consistent arguments in response to the opinion-eliciting question than to the devil's advocate question. Deceptive pairs were expected to be equally consistent with each other in response to both questions. Method Forty-nine pairs of participants were matched, based on their strong opinions about a controversial topic, and were asked to either tell the truth or lie about their opinions to an interviewer. Pair members were permitted to prepare for the interview together. Each participant was interviewed individually with the devil's advocate approach. Results Prepared truth-telling pairs were more consistent with each other in response to the opinion-eliciting question than to the devil's advocate question. However, and as predicted, deceptive pairs were equally consistent with each other in response to both questions. Conclusions The Devil's Advocate approach seems to be a promising interview technique for assessing consistency among pairs who hold false opinions and pairs who hold true opinions. It also has implications for the consistency heuristic as consistency is not diagnostic of deception or honesty unless the interview technique is taken into consideration.
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| 3. |
- Ernberg, Emelie, 1989, et al.
(author)
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Court evaluations of young children's testimony in child sexual abuse cases
- 2018
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In: Legal and Criminological Psychology. - : Wiley. - 1355-3259. ; 23:2, s. 176-191
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Purpose Prosecutors working with child sexual abuse (CSA) cases involving young children have raised concerns that reliability criteria from the Supreme Court of Sweden are holding children's testimony to impossible standards (e.g., expecting the child's testimony to be long, rich in detail and spontaneous). This study aimed to address these concerns by investigating how District Courts and Courts of Appeal employ said criteria in their testimonial assessments of young child complainants. Methods Court documents from District Courts (n = 100) and Courts of Appeal (n = 45) in CSA cases involving 100 children age 7 years and under were analysed with respect to the courts’ testimonial assessments. Results Testimonial assessments were more frequently referenced in acquitting verdicts and in cases with evidence of low corroborative value. Richness in detail was the most frequently used reliability criterion, followed by spontaneity. Most criteria were used in favour of the children's testimony. However, the length criterion was typically used against the reliability of the children's testimony. Conclusions Our findings confirm prosecutors’ concerns that criteria from the Supreme Court are frequently used in evaluations of young children's testimony. This is troublesome, as some criteria do not correspond to current research on young children's witness abilities. For example, compared to testimony given by older children or adults, testimony provided by a young child is typically not long or rich in detail. We encourage prosecutors to extend their own knowledge on young children's capability as witnesses and present this to the court.
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| 4. |
- Granhag, Pär-Anders, 1964, et al.
(author)
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Eliciting intelligence from human sources: The first scientific test of the Scharff-technique
- 2015
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In: Legal and Criminological Psychology. - : Wiley. - 1355-3259. ; 20:1, s. 96-113
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Purpose The gathering of human intelligence (HUMINT) is of utmost importance, yet the scientific literature is silent with respect to the effectiveness of different information elicitation techniques. Our aim was to remedy this by conducting the first scientific test of the so-called Scharff technique (named after the successful German WWII interrogator). Method We developed a new experimental paradigm, mirroring some main features of a typical HUMINT situation. The participants (N = 93) were given information on a planned terrorist attack, and were instructed to strike a balance between not revealing too much or too little information in an upcoming interview. One third was interviewed with the Scharff technique (conceptualized to include four different tactics), one-third was asked open questions only, and the final third was asked specific questions only. The effectiveness of the three techniques was assessed by a novel set of objective and subjective measures. Results Our main findings show that (1) the three techniques did not differ with respect to the objective amount of new information gathered; (2) the participants in the Scharff condition perceived (as predicted) that it was more difficult to read the interviewer's information objectives; and (3) the participants in the Scharff- and the Open-question condition (incorrectly) perceived to have revealed significantly less information than the participants in the Specific question condition. Conclusions We presented a new experimental paradigm, and new dependent measures, for studying the effectiveness of different information elicitation techniques. We consider the outcome for the Scharff technique as rather promising, but future refinements are needed.
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| 5. |
- Landström, Sara, 1980, et al.
(author)
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Children’s testimony and the emotional victim effect
- 2015
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In: Legal and Criminological Psychology. - : Wiley. - 1355-3259 .- 2044-8333. ; 20:2, s. 365-383
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Purpose. Two experiments were conducted to examine the effects of (1) child victims’ emotional expression during testimony and (2) the camera perspective used to record the testimony, on judgements of credibility. Methods. Law students (N = 155 in Experiment 1; N = 86 in Experiment 2) watched a child harassment complainant provide a statement in an emotional or neutral manner, presented using different camera perspectives: balanced focus (i.e., a shot portraying an equal focus on the child complainant and the interviewer) versus picture-in-picture (PiP; i.e., a shot portraying only the child with an inset window depicting both the child and the interviewer in the corner of the screen) in Experiment 1 and PiP versus child focus (i.e., a shot depicting only the child) in Experiment 2. Results. Although no effect was found for camera perspective, the results provide support for an emotional victim effect (EVE); the child was perceived as more credible and truthful when communicating the statement in an emotional (vs. neutral) manner. Moreover, the results provide corroborating evidence for the assumption that the EVE rests on both cognitive (expectancy confirmation) and affective (compassion) mechanisms. Conclusions. These findings extend previous research by showing that the EVE and its underlying mechanisms apply to judgements of child complainants in the context of non sexual crimes and appear to be robust against variations of camera perspectives. Legal implications are discussed.
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| 6. |
- Nahari, G., et al.
(author)
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'Language of lies': Urgent issues and prospects in verbal lie detection research
- 2019
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In: Legal and Criminological Psychology. - : Wiley. - 1355-3259 .- 2044-8333. ; 24:1, s. 1-23
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Since its introduction into the field of deception detection, the verbal channel has become a rapidly growing area of research. The basic assumption is that liars differ from truth tellers in their verbal behaviour, making it possible to classify them by inspecting their verbal accounts. However, as noted in conferences and in private communication between researchers, the field of verbal lie detection faces several challenges that merit focused attention. The first author therefore proposed a workshop with the mission of promoting solutions for urgent issues in the field. Nine researchers and three practitioners with experience in credibility assessments gathered for 3 days of discussion at Bar-Ilan University (Israel) in the first international verbal lie detection workshop. The primary session of the workshop took place the morning of the first day. In this session, each of the participants had up to 10 min to deliver a brief message, using just one slide. Researchers were asked to answer the question: 'In your view, what is the most urgent, unsolved question/issue in verbal lie detection?' Similarly, practitioners were asked: 'As a practitioner, what question/issue do you wish verbal lie detection research would address?' The issues raised served as the basis for the discussions that were held throughout the workshop. The current paper first presents the urgent, unsolved issues raised by the workshop group members in the main session, followed by a message to researchers in the field, designed to deliver the insights, decisions, and conclusions resulting from the discussions.
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| 7. |
- Oleszkiewicz, Simon, 1982, et al.
(author)
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Eliciting information from human sources: Training handlers in the Scharff technique
- 2017
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In: Legal and Criminological Psychology. - : Wiley. - 1355-3259 .- 2044-8333. ; 22:2, s. 400-419
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Purpose: In previous laboratory-based work, the Scharff technique has proved successful for gathering intelligence from human sources. However, little is known about whether the technique can be taught to practitioners, and whether Scharff-trained practitioners will interview more effectively than colleagues using their conventional approaches and tactics. Method: We examined professional handlers from the Norwegian Police (n = 64), all experienced in interacting with informants. Half received training in the Scharff technique, and their performance was compared against handlers receiving no Scharff training and free to use the approaches they saw fit. All handlers received the same case file describing a source holding information about a future terrorist attack and were given the same interview objectives. Police trainees (n = 64) took on the role of semicooperative sources and were given incomplete information about the attack. Results: The trained handlers adhered to the Scharff training as they (1) aimed to establish the illusion of 'knowing-it-all', (2) posed claims to collect information, and (3) asked few (if any) explicit questions. In contrast, the untrained handlers tried to evoke the sources' motivation to reveal information and asked a high number of explicit questions. Scharff-trained handlers were perceived as less eager to gather information, but collected comparatively more new information. Conclusions: The Scharff-trained interviewers utilized more specific elicitation tactics (e.g., posing claims) and fewer general interview strategies (e.g., evoking motivation), and they collected comparatively more new information. This captures the essence of the Scharff technique: It is subtle, yet effective.
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| 8. |
- Sooniste, Tuule, 1985, et al.
(author)
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Discriminating between true and false intent among small cells of suspects
- 2016
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In: Legal and Criminological Psychology. - : Wiley. - 1355-3259. ; 21:2, s. 344-357
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Purpose Despite high potential value for real-life situations, detecting true and false intentions by groups of suspects have not been previously investigated. Method The experimental study had a set-up in which participants (N = 232), half in dyads and half in quartets, planned for either a mock crime or a non-criminal event. In structured individual interviews, all participants were asked one set of questions targeting their intentions (anticipated questions) and one set of questions targeting the planning phase of the intentions (unanticipated questions). We scored the level of detail and consistency in participants' interview responses. Results As predicted, questions on the planning phase were perceived as unanticipated and difficult to answer by both liars and truth tellers. Truth tellers' answers to the question on intent were perceived as more detailed compared to the liars. Cells of truth tellers and liars achieved an equally high within-group consistency for their answers to the questions on the stated intentions, whereas cells of truth tellers achieved a higher within-group consistency for the answers to the questions on the planning phase. Finally, truth tellers' descriptions of their intentions contained more information related to how to attain the stated goal, whereas liars gave more information related to why it was necessary to attain the stated goal. Conclusions Asking anticipated and unanticipated questions can be a successful way of eliciting cues to true and false intentions among small cells of suspects.
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