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Emma Phillips North Yorkshire Police PhD Candidate, Teesside University

The relationship between type of questions and investigative relevant information in Child Sex Abuse Cases. Emma Phillips North Yorkshire Police PhD Candidate, Teesside University. Legal & Procedural Framework. Investigative Interviews used as ‘Evidence in Chief’

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Emma Phillips North Yorkshire Police PhD Candidate, Teesside University

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  1. The relationship between type of questions and investigative relevant information in Child Sex Abuse Cases Emma Phillips North Yorkshire Police PhD Candidate, Teesside University

  2. Legal & Procedural Framework • Investigative Interviews used as ‘Evidence in Chief’ • Achieving Best Evidence Guidance (ABEG) (Home Office, 2007) • Predominant use of Open e.g‘Tell me about what happened’and non leading questions e.g. ‘Can you describe for me whereabouts you were sleeping?’ • Some Closed questions e.g. ‘Did you go out last night?’

  3. Research Findings • Lamb et al. (1996) • Open questions three times long and richer than direct, leading or suggestive utterances. • Lamb, Sternberg & Esplin, (2000) • The number of details elicited in interviews increases with children’s age • Davies, Westcott & Horan (2000) • 4-7 years old, 8-11 years old and 12-14 years old • Few open questions OCR 1:50 • Open questions – 12 – 14 years • Focused questions – younger children • Dent & Stephenson (1979) • Open questions elicited more truthful statements • Oates & Shrimpton, (1991) • Younger children fewer details, not necessarily less accurate

  4. Literature Gap • Whilst open questions may elicit longer, richer, more truthful responses – does not identify if the details are actually relevant to the investigation • Yuille & Cutshall (1986) • (i) Person, (ii) Object, (iii) Action • Milne & Bull (2003) • Coded each time the interviewee conveys new details • Lamb et al. (2007) • More central details e.g. Sex acts, force used etc provided by children using free recall questions.

  5. Research Aims • Establish whether different question types affects the amount of Investigation Relevant Information (IRI) details elicited from the child. • Establish whether Open and free recall prompts elicit more IRI than Closed or focused recall prompts. • Identify if the age of the child has an effect on the number of IRI details elicited during the interview with older children disclosing more IRI than younger children.

  6. Methodological Sample • All interview transcripts (N=21) were obtained from one English Police Force • Interviews conducted between 2006 (n=7) and 2007 (n=14). • All interviewing officers were female with a mean age of 38 years (range: 29-46). • All were ABE trained and had completed the 6 week CID course. • 95% (n=20) of the children interviewed were female with a mean age of 11 years (SD: 3) and a range of 5 years to 15 years.

  7. Methodological Sample • Mean interview length 40.18 mins (SD: 32.2) • Range 15 – 120 minutes • 23% (n=4) interviews related to historic abuse • 32% (n=6) were Intra-familial offences • 43% (n=9) Teacher, 33% (n=7) Family Friend and 24% (n=5) Family Member

  8. Data Coding • Interviews transcribed in full • Coded in terms of Question Type (Adapted from Oxburgh, Ost, & Cherryman in press) • The number and type of questions were calculated for each interview

  9. Data Coding • All transcripts were then coded each time a child mentioned any IRI detail • Marked each time the interviewee discussed the detail as new information • Repeat details were not coded (Lamb et al., 2007; Milne & Bull, 2003, Oxburgh, et al., in press) • Inter-rate reliability was 89%

  10. Results: Question Type • Significantly more Probing/Identification than Open questions (t = 11.704, df=20, p = 0.05, one-tailed) • Significantly more Closed than Open questions • (t = 8.484, df = 20, p = 0.05, one-tailed). • Significantly more Appropriate than Inappropriate questions (t = 4.040, df = 20, p < 0.05, one-tailed)

  11. Results: Total IRI Elicited

  12. Results: IRI by Question Type

  13. Results: IRI details by Child Age Number of IRI details elicited Child Age Child age had an significant effect on IRI (F (2,18) = 7.125, p = 0.05) Historic abuse had no significant impact on IRI (F (1,19) = 1.386, p > 0.05) Total no of qu asked had no significant impact on IRI (F (1,19) = 4.616, p > 0.05)

  14. Discussion Appropriate or invitational questions specifically probing/identification Disagreement in the field over Open questions Child Age – Davies et al. (2000); Lamb et al. (1996) Impact on future research

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