Natalie Martschuk

Securing reliable information in investigative interviews: Coercive and noncoercive strategies preceding turning points

ABSTRACT Investigative interviewers apply a range of physical, cognitive, social or legalistic strategies to secure information from suspects. The perceived effectiveness of coercive and noncoercive strategies on turning points was examined by interviewing 34 practitioners and 30 high value detainees in East Asian and Western jurisdictions. Each recounted an interview with an initially uncooperative detainee who became cooperative, or an initially cooperative detainee who became resistant or silent. Analyses of interview narratives identified perceived turning points in the practitioner-suspect relationship associated with clear outcomes. Independent of jurisdiction, 56% of the noncoercive strategies were associated with cooperation, yielding reliable information in 49.4% and true admissions in 20.0% of the cases. In contrast, coercive strategies were perceived as more ineffective (58.9%) than effective (14.6%) in securing information. Physical coercion, intimidation and deception were most frequently acknowledged to yield false information. These findings suggested prioritisation of noncoercive social and physical interview strategies and international consensus on best practices.

Effects of Terrorist Charges and Threatening Conduct on Mock Jurors’ Decisions

Terror management theory posits that fear of death influences judgments in criminal cases. A between-subjects study examined the influence of mortality and terrorism salience in the context of life-threatening versus non-threatening criminal conduct on mock jurors’ emotions and judgments of convictions by 485 jury-eligible Australian citizens. Mortality salience did not impact upon mock jurors’ judgments, indicating that exposure to a criminal trial mitigated the effect. The participants reported more negative emotions with a suspect charged with a terrorism than non-terrorism crime, independently of criminal conduct. Mock jurors were more likely to convict a suspected terrorist (66.4%) than a defendant charged with murder when the criminal conduct entailed throwing a paint bomb (54.0%). When the actus reus was life-threatening, they were more likely to convict a defendant charged with intent to murder (81.5%) than with a terrorist crime (69.7%). The findings indicated that jurors can be influenced by numerous factors at court, including fear of death.

Memory for faces in old age: A meta-analysis.

The present meta-analysis investigated the influence of age on face recognition. A total of 19 studies with 79 comparisons of younger and older participants were included. Analyses revealed small to moderate effects for hits, and large effects for false alarms and signal detection theory (SDT) measures. Younger participants outperformed older participants on most face recognition measures. Younger participants made more hits (gu = 0.31) and fewer false alarms (gu = 0.95) and thus had better SDT recognition performance (gu = 1.01) than older participants. These effects were largest for young faces, smaller for mixed-age faces, and smallest for older faces. Furthermore, older participants used a more liberal response criterion, that is, they were more likely to choose a face than younger participants (gu = 0.54). Meta-regression analyses revealed that young faces (vs. mixed-age faces) and longer retention intervals were associated with greater differences between the age groups for hits but not for false alarms. Funnel plot and trim-and-fill analyses indicated the presence of a publication bias. Theoretical implications for future research and for older people as eyewitnesses are outlined.

Similarities in modi operandi of institutional and non-institutional child sexual offending: Systematic case comparisons

Little is known about the extent to whichinstitutional child sex offending differs from non-institutional offending. Strategies to secure the compliance of child victims were systematically compared to compare the modi operandi (prior to, during and following abuse), and the type of power (intimate, aggressive, coercive) applied by child sexual offenders in institutional versus non-institutional settings. A sample of 59 of the most recent child sexual abuse cases referred for prosecution in three Australian states was manually reviewed and coded. Of these, six were cases of institutional abuse, one of which involved crossover offending. Based on complainant age and gender and patterns in offending behaviors, institutional cases were matched with cases of non-institutional abuse. Complainants of both genders ranged in age from 5 to 16 years at abuse onset. Offenders were male family members or friends, priests, an employer and one female school teacher. Results demonstrated commonalities in the modi operandi and grooming methods applied in institutional and non-institutional contexts. Implications for abuse prevention are summarized.

Validation of the Child Sexual Abuse Knowledge Questionnaire

ABSTRACT A validation study of the Child Sexual Abuse Knowledge Questionnaire (CSA-KQ) was conducted on a sample of 1712 non-empanelled jurors in the greater Sydney area, Australia. The CSA-KQ contains nine items derived from empirical findings on common misconceptions about typical features of abuse offences, children’s responses to child sexual abuse, and their ability to give reliable evidence. Study 1 tested the factor structure of the questionnaire in a sample of 843 non-empanelled jurors. The best model indicated by exploratory factor analysis had two factors: the Impact of Sexual Abuse on Children and Contextual Influences on the Report. Study 2 cross-validated the findings and tested the predictive validity of the CSA-KQ in a realistic simulated trial in which an 11-year-old complainant alleged abuse by her grandfather. Confirmatory factor analysis replicated the findings of Study 1, showing strong reliability for each of the factors (ρy = 0.70 to ρy = 0.80) and for the CSA-KQ (ρy = 0.76). CSA-KQ scores were significantly correlated with the perceived credibility of the complainant (r = 0.23). Moreover, the CSA-KQ scores predicted verdict: jurors with greater knowledge about CSA were more likely to convict the defendant than jurors who knew less about CSA.