Has the Quality of Investigative Interviews with Children Improved with Changes in Guidance? An Exploratory Study

Abstract

This study examined whether the revised guidance on the conduct of investigative interviews with children had improved quality and completeness. Transcripts from Family Court proceedings of 13 interviews conducted between 1993 and 1998 under the Memorandum of Good Practice were compared to 12 interviews taken from 2002 to 2009 under Achieving Best Evidence (ABE). Analysis suggested that ABE had positive effects on Rapport: ABE inter-views included significantly more ground rules and were more likely to use an appropriate example of lying. However, on all other measures, the two samples showed no differences and demonstrated the same shortcomings as earlier published studies: failure to include all four phases of the interview; overuse of specific and closed compared to open questions, and incomplete or missing closure phases. It is argued that improvements in overall interview quality are best achieved by a continuing programme of peer monitoring and constructive evaluation.