Trying to improve child and young adult witnesses' performance

• Main Author: Kask, Kristjan
• Published: University of Leicester 2008
• Subjects: 155
• Online Access: http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.490763

As the number of children who testify in court increases, so does the need to obtain accurate information.;The present PhD thesis aimed to examine possible ways of trying to improve child and young adult witnesses' testimony. The author was particularly interested in questioning methods with children, young adults' person descriptions, and face recognition and identification ability of both children and young adults (including the ability to recognize different race faces). Chapter 1 reviews the relevant literature.;Chapter 2 presents a meta-analysis of identification studies involving children. Chapter 3 examines Estonian investigators' questioning styles with child witnesses focusing on the length and type of details in children's answers to questions. Chapter 4 examines the effects of using a person in young adult witnesses' visual field as a comparison (or 'standard) to assist their recall of a previously seen, different person. Chapters 5 and 6 present the comparison of Estonian children's and young adults' face recognition ability of different race faces, as there appear to have been published no studies of the cross-racial effect in less 'westernised' societies, such as in Estonia. Also new sequential target presentation methods were used.;All results are discussed with reference to previous findings.