Conditions That Affect Children’s Suggestibility

(Compiled by NCRJ Advisor, Dr. Carol Tavris)

• The child is younger than 4 or 5, and thus more likely to have source amnesia (inability to recall source of the memory—actually seeing something or hearing about it).

• The child offers more and more details about the event with each telling.

• The child wishes to please the interviewer.

• The interviewer tells the child that “everyone else” has confessed that a suspected adult molested them.

• The interviewers repeatedly ask the same question.

• The child is threatened, offered bribes, or accused of lying if he or she doesn’t give the “right” answers.

• The interviewer doesn’t believe the child’s denials.

• The interviewer is convinced that the child has been molested and thus hears only what the child says that seems to confirm that belief.

Sources: Bruck et al., 1998; Ceci & Bruck, 1995; Garven et al., 1998, 2000; Poole & Lamb, 1998