Transcript Children in Court: Taking Testimony from Children

Children in Court:
Taking Testimony
from Children
Tennessee Joint Task Force
on Children’s Justice/
Child Sexual Abuse
Presented by Anne Fisher
Agenda

Developmental Expectations –



What is the best case scenario?
Qualifying Children to Take the Oath
A Structured Conversation with a Child
Building Rapport
 Getting to the Topic of Concern
 Problem Areas in Questioning


Understanding Children’s Language
Developmental
Expectations
Generally Speaking …

Typically-developed children under 12




Preschoolers, Adolescents, Children with Special
Needs are considered special populations
Cultural Differences
Placement/moves in foster care  regression
Sustained abuse/neglect  development 1-1 ½
years below average
Guidelines for Age-Appropriate Questions
Who
Age 3
Age 4
Ages
5-6
Ages
7-8
Ages
9-10
Ages
11-12
What
Where
When
How
# of
times
Circumstance
Notes about Developmental Guidelines





Represent average, general abilities
Stress affects children’s cognitive/ linguistic
performance
Trauma interferes with memory
Reluctance to discuss abuse is common
New research about time: 10-12 important
developmentally
Qualifying Children
to Take the Oath
Qualifying Children to Take the Oath



Despite seriously delayed vocabulary skills, most
maltreated children by 5 have a basic
understanding of the meaning and morality of
lying … depending on how that is assessed
Often, children who can identify truths/lies
cannot provide minimally sufficient definitions
of “truth”/“lies”
Young children may be reluctant to discuss lying
Lyon & Saywitz, 1999, “Young Maltreated Children’s Competence to
Take the Oath,” Applied Developmental Science, 3, 1, 16-27
Qualifying: Two Tasks


Truth vs. Lie
Evaluate whether child understands that “truth”
and “lie” refer to statements that correspond to
reality and statements that fail to correspond to
reality
Morality
Determines whether a child understands the
consequences of telling a lie
Instructions







Give the child the 4 truth vs. lie tasks
Emphasize words in capital letters
When child answers, say “okay” in a friendly manner
Always start with the child on left side of the picture
Give the child 4 morality tasks
Ask the child to promise to tell the truth
“I talk with lots of children. It’s always important that
they tell me the truth. So, before we begin, I want to
make sure that you understand how important it is to
tell the truth.”
Truth vs. Lie
Task



Changes from ♀ to ♂
Changes question from
“truth” to “lie”
Changes which side is
correct answer
Morality Task
“Here’s a lady who
comes to visit these
girls at home.”
“Here’s a doctor.
She wants to know
what happened to
these boys.”
Structured
Conversation
with a Child
Setting

When possible – reduce the power
differential

In chambers?
Comfortable/appropriately-sized furniture
 Let the child choose seat

Lose the robe?
 Sit at the same level as the child
 Have child-friendly area/
furnishings, décor/materials

Building Rapport

Purposes
Put child at ease
 Generate flow of conversation
 Help child understand your expectations
 Help you understand child’s conversational
abilities in this setting


In forensic interview … 7-9 minutes
(average)
Building Rapport:
Looking for the “Spark”


Introduce yourself as simply as you can
Ask open-ended questions




I’d like to get to know you; tell me about yourself.
What do you like to do?
Tell me about school.
For very small children, small subjects work



Did you have breakfast? Tell me about it
Tell me everything you did today before you got here.
Tell me all about your room/favorite toy/pet
Useful Statements
in Child Interviews


“Tell me everything you remember …”
“I wasn’t there, so I need you to tell me what
happened.”



Kids think that if they told one adult, other adults
know
“Even if you think I know, tell me anyway.”
“Even if you think it doesn’t matter …”
Useful Statements
in Child Interviews

“It’s okay to tell me that you don’t know.”


“It’s okay to tell me that you don’t understand.”



One of the first conversational rules that children learn: you
take turns in conversation, and every question has an answer
Strategy for understanding unknown words: look for
something familiar from experience/education
Scarpology
“It’s okay to correct me if I make a mistake.”
Shifting to Topic of Concern

Use the “hourglass” method




Focus on concrete, observable elements and details


Open-ended questions/prompts: “Tell me about your
Mom.”
When the narrative is exhausted  focused questions:
“What happens when Mom gets mad?”
Return to open-ended prompts: “Tell me all about that.”
Using marijuana
Ensure that you share vocabulary

“Sex”? What happened to her/his body?
Talking about the Issue (s)

Use reflective statements to “check-in”


Ask 1 question at a time, allow time to formulate an
answer


Count to 8-10 before rephrasing
Signal when you are shifting to a different topic or time


Establish at beginning that they should correct you if you
make a mistake
Frame the question first (“I’d like to ask you about …”)
Use the child’s name often
Problem Areas in Questioning







Estimates of measurement – size,
speed, distance, height, weight, length
– before 10
Estimates of time
Negative stereotypes
Never ask the child to guess
Repeated Questions
Presumptive Questions
Leading/Misleading Questions
Understanding
Children’s Language
Requirements for Answering
Questions




Must be able to remember the question from
beginning to end
Must be able to pay attention to the question
Can’t give an accurate answer if you don’t
understand the question
Response to a question is not necessarily an
answer – Follow up!
Kids and Language



Adults and children do not speak the same language
Kids are egocentric  restricted ability to reason &
compare
Language and cognition develop at different rates


Words come first, meaning comes later.
Children have concrete interpretation of language
based on sound, experience  create language based
on analogy to familiar words

e.g., a baby caterpillar is a “kittenpillar”
Young Children and Language

Struggle with higher order or umbrella words




“Clothes” may not include pajamas, bathing suits
Tend to believe that adults know what they
know
Believe adults are right, sincere, wouldn’t trick
them
Cannot make “source attribution”

Focus on sensory information
Using Clear Language

Add an open-ended option to forced-choice questions


Do not assume that a child knows the meaning of a
word he/she uses OR that you mean the same thing



“Was it at your Mom’s house, your Dad’s house, or somewhere
else?”
“He tickled me.”
Use names of places (geographic or anatomical) – “the
house on Main Street,” “your peter” – instead of vague
referents – “over there,” “down there”
Avoid relationship words

Use names instead of (or paired with) “your stepfather,”
“your foster mother,” or “your real mom”
Using Clear Language





Avoid quantifiers like “a couple,” “several,” “most”
Avoid asking “why” (because it can sound accusatory)
Avoid beginning questions with “Do you remember
…” or “Can you…”
“Before” and “After” are slippery before age 7/8
Negation takes longer to process.

Use of simple negatives (not/no) in a question appears to
increase the chance of an incorrect answer by AT LEAST
50% in children age 4-10 (Graffam-Walker)
“Some” Vs. “Any”




“I ate
ice cream.”
“I didn’t eat
ice cream.”
Did he say something? Did he say anything? (Is
this the same question?)
“Some” patterns with neutral or positive
response, “Any” patterns very strongly with
negative – 2x more likely to get negative
response with “any” than “some.”
Avoiding Problems w/ Pronouns,
Pointing Words


When YOU speak
 Be specific
 Put nouns back in
 Indexicals (words that point – personal pronouns,
here/there, this/that, come/go, bring/take)
 Incorporate phrases from earlier questions and/or
statements
When the CHILD speaks
 Don’t take meaning of pronouns for granted
 Be alert if responses seem inconsistent, confused
References




Graffam Walker, 1999, Handbook on Questioning Children: A
Linguistic Perspective (ABA Center for Children and the Law).
Lyon & Saywitz, 1999, “Young Maltreated Children’s
Competence to Take the Oath,” Applied Developmental Science, 3, 1,
16-27
Friedman & Lyon, 2005, “Development of TemporalReconstructive Abilities,” Child Development, 76, 6
Orbach & Lamb, 2007, “Young Children’s References to
Temporal Attributes of Allegedly Experienced Events in the
Course of Forensic Interviews,” Child Development, 78, 4
Contact Information
Anne Fisher
Forensic Interviewer
Montgomery County Child Advocacy Center
227 A Dunbar Cave Road
Clarksville, TN 37043
[email protected]
(931) 553-5140