Stefanie J. Sharman

Imagination or exposure causes imagination inflation

To examine the effects of exposure to complex autobiographical events on imagination inflation, subjects performed a 3-stage procedure. First, they rated their confidence that a list of events had happened in their childhood. Second, subjects imagined and paraphrased complex fictitious events 0, 1, 3, or 5 times. Finally, they rated their confidence for the childhood events a second time. We found that subjects became more confident that the fictitious events really did happen in childhood, regardless of whether they were imagined or paraphrased. There was no repetition effect beyond that of a single exposure. Taken together with the results of other research, our data suggest that the greater processing fluency associated with the target events drives imagination inflation.

Examining Memory for Heterosexual College Students' Sexual Experiences Using an Electronic Mail Diary

To examine memory for sexual expenences, the authors asked 37 sexually active, nonmonogamous, heterosexual college students to complete an e-mail diary every day for 1 month. The diary contained questions about their sexual behaviors. Six to 12 months later, they returned for a surprise memory test, which contained questions about their sexual experiences from the diary phase. They were asked about their sexual partners, the types of sexual experiences they had, and condom use. Participants underreported the number of partners they had, but they overreported both sexual experiences and condom use. The results have implications for both sexual health educators and for people who engage in high-risk sexual behaviors.

Imagination inflation is a fact, not an artifact: A reply to Pezdek and Eddy

Pezdek and Eddy (2001) claim to prove that imagination inflation is a spurious effect caused by regression to the mean (RTM). They make four predictions about what patterns of data would demonstrate a genuine effect for imagination versus those that would be explainable by RTM. We review each of those predictions, and demonstrate significant problems with them. We conclude that imagination inflation is a genuine effect, and that Pezdek and Eddy’s work has contributed to the growing research showing that when people imagine fictitious events from long ago, they become more confident that those false events were genuine experiences.

Factors Related to the Accuracy of Self-Reported Dietary Intake of Children Aged 6 to 12 Years Elicited with Interviews: A Systematic Review

BACKGROUND Understanding the relationship between childrens dietary consumption and health is important. As such, it is crucial to explore factors related to the accuracy of childrens reports of what they consumed. OBJECTIVE The objective was to evaluate factors related to the accuracy of self-reported dietary intake information elicited by interview methods from children aged 6 to 12 years. METHODS A systematic review of English articles using PsycINFO, PsycARTICLES, PsycEXTRA, PsycBOOKS, CINAHL Complete, Global Health, and MEDLINE Complete was performed. Search terms included interview, diet, children, and recall; studies were limited to those published from 1970 onward. Additional studies were identified using the reference lists of published articles. Studies that assessed childrens dietary intake using direct observation, doubly labeled water, or the double-portion method and compared it with their recall of that intake (unassisted by parents) using an interview were included. RESULTS The 45 studies that met the inclusion criteria showed that specific interview techniques designed to enhance childrens recall accuracy had little effect. Rather, the timing of the interview appeared most important: The shorter the retention interval between childrens consumption and their recall, the more accurate their memories. Childrens age, body mass index, social desirability, food preferences, and cognitive ability were also related to accuracy. CONCLUSIONS Factors related to the accuracy of childrens dietary reporting should be taken into consideration when asking about consumption. Further research is required to examine whether other interview techniques, such as those developed to enhance childrens recall of repeated staged events, can improve childrens dietary reporting accuracy.

Psychotropic placebos create resistance to the misinformation effect

Can a placebo for a psychotropic drug help participants resist the misinformation effect? To answer this question, we gave participants a mixture of baking soda and water and told half of them that the mixture was a cognition-enhancing drug called R273 and told the other half that it was an inactive version of the drug. Shortly thereafter, all participants took part in a three-stage misinformation experiment. Compared with participants who were told that they had taken the placebo, the participants who were told that they had taken the drug reported improved cognitive abilities and were less susceptible to the misinformation effect. We provide sourcemonitoring and mindfulness accounts of our findings.

Imagining nice and nasty events in childhood or adulthood: recent positive events show the most imagination inflation.

We explored whether event recency and valence affect peoples susceptibility to imagination inflation. Using a three-stage procedure, subjects imagined positive and negative events happening in their distant or recent past. First, subjects rated how confident they were that they had experienced particular positive and negative events in childhood or adulthood using a Life Events Inventory (LEI). Two weeks later, they imagined two positive and two negative events from the LEI. Finally, they rated their confidence on the LEI a second time. For positive events, subjects showed more imagination inflation for adulthood than childhood events. For negative events, they showed no difference in imagination inflation for adulthood and childhood events. We discuss factors that may influence source confusions for memories of the past and highlight directions for future research.

Assessing the Effectiveness of the Cognitive Interview for Children with Severe Intellectual Disabilities

We examined whether the cognitive interview (CI) procedure increased event recall in children with severe intellectual disabilities (ID) compared with children with no ID. Forty-six children with and without ID watched a videotaped event; they were aged between eight and 11 years. The next day they were individually interviewed using the CI or a structured interview (SI). Interviews consisted of free recall and specific questions, some of which contained leading or misleading information. The leading and misleading questions determined children’s susceptibility to information presented after the event. Overall, children without ID reported more correct information than children with ID. For all children, the CI led to more correct recall than the SI without increases in incorrect details or confabulations. Although the CI did not decrease children’s susceptibility to the misleading questions compared with the SI, children without ID disagreed with more of the misleading suggestions than children with ID. These results suggest that the CI may indeed be a valuable tool to elicit information from very vulnerable witnesses.

A Review of the Impact of Different Types of Leading Interview Questions on Child and Adult Witnesses with Intellectual Disabilities

Children and adults with intellectual disabilities have traditionally been considered poor witnesses because they are easily misled and produce less accurate information in interviews when compared with individuals without intellectual disabilities. However, witnesses’ levels of accuracy depend on the types of questions that they are asked, such as whether they are open or closed and whether they contain misleading information. In the current systematic review, we examined the literature investigating the different types of misleading questions commonly used in interviews, and their influence on the memories of adults and children with and without an intellectual disability. Thirteen articles that met inclusion criteria were reviewed. It was found that, compared with other question types, open and closed questions that presumed certain information to be true elicited the greatest number of errors in children and adults with intellectual disabilities compared with other question types. These findings reinforce the notion that the onus is on interviewers – particularly when interviewing vulnerable witnesses – to avoid leading questions that presume information that may not be true.

Does the Cognitive Interview Promote the Coherence of Narrative Accounts in Children With and Without an Intellectual Disability

We examined whether the cognitive interview (CI) procedure enhanced the coherence of narrative accounts provided by children with and without intellectual disabilities (ID), matched on chronological age. Children watched a videotaped magic show; one day later, they were interviewed using the CI or a structured interview (SI). Children interviewed using the CI reported more correct details than those interviewed using the SI. Additionally, children interviewed using the CI reported more contextual background details, more logically ordered sequences, more temporal markers, and fewer inconsistencies in their stories than those interviewed using the SI. However, the CI did not increase the number of story grammar elements compared with the SI. Overall children interviewed with the CI told better stories than those interviewed with the SI. This finding provided further support for the effectiveness of the CI with vulnerable witnesses, particularly children with ID.

The Relationship Between Children's Age and Disclosures of Sexual Abuse During Forensic Interviews.

Children’s disclosures of sexual abuse during forensic interviews are fundamental to the investigation of cases. Research examining the relationship between age and disclosure has shown mixed results; the aim of the current study was to clarify and extend our knowledge by modeling linear, quadratic, and interaction effects of age on disclosure. Child sexual abuse reports made by children, their caregivers, or mandated reporters over a 12-month period to police in one state of Australia were examined. Of the 527 children (age range 3–16 years) offered a forensic interview, 81% disclosed abuse during it. The other 19% did not disclose or refused the interview. Age had both linear and quadratic effects, whereby disclosure increased with age until 11 years, after which disclosure decreased with age to 16 years. The effect of age on disclosure was moderated by five variables: abuse severity, the child–suspect relationship, suspects’ violence histories, delay of report to police, and children’s previous disclosures. Particular groups of children had lower likelihoods of disclosing abuse in forensic interviews than others, such as adolescents who alleged abuse against suspects with histories of violent offending. By identifying these groups, targeted strategies may be developed to help increase their disclosure rates.