Suggestibility in children's eyewitness testimony: Cognitive and social influences.

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

Research on children's suggestibility has identified various cognitive and social factors that influence young children's suggestibility, yet potential interaction effects of cognitive and social factors have not been examined. The present study attempted to identify factors influencing the accuracy of young children's eyewitness testimony by comparing the effects of cognitive and social demands on preschool and elementary school aged children. Additionally, the present study sought to identify specific conditions under which young children demonstrate decreased suggestibility.
A total of 172 subjects participated in the study; 85 four-year-olds and 87 eight-year-olds. Children were randomly assigned to either high or low cognitive demand conditions and to either high or low social demand conditions. Participants in high cognitive demand conditions were not cued, while participants in low cognitive demand conditions were provided with cognitive cueing to facilitate event recall. High social demand subjects were interviewed by an adult interviewer and low social demand subjects were interviewed by a child. Each subject was assigned to one of four cognitive/social condition groups: Not Cued/Adult Interviewer, Not Cued/Child Interviewer, Cognitively Cued/Adult Interviewer, Cognitively Cued/Child Interviewer. All subjects participated in a game-playing event and were individually questioned 2 days after the event and again 2 days later. Participants in all conditions were exposed to misinformation during the first interview. Suggestibility was calculated as the number of incorrect statements incorporated into the second interview report.
Four-year-olds in the present study demonstrated higher suggestibility than eight-year-olds in all experimental conditions. A significant main effect for cognitive condition indicated that children who were provided with cognitive cueing were less suggestible or less likely to incorporate misinformation into their event recall than those children who did not receive cueing. An age x cognitive condition interaction indicated a developmental trend with the effect of cognitive condition on suggestibility differing as a function of age. The interaction of age x cognitive condition x social condition was marginally significant, endorsing the merit of future study of developmental differences in the integration of multiple influences on children's suggestibility.