Children's Comprehension and Memory of Event Sequences and Its Implications for Maltreatment Disclosure

项目摘要/摘要 虐待儿童被广泛认为是对儿童福祉和健康的严重威胁。在虐待中 在案件中，儿童证人/受害者报告的保真度和可信度往往对确保在 为了孩子的最大利益。从儿童那里获取关于指称的时间进程和顺序的信息 虐待是这些案件的核心问题。儿童访谈领域正在积极辩论如何最好地提出问题 在这些情况下，儿童对序列的了解很少，几乎没有实证研究可供借鉴。有一个 迫切需要确定从认知能力较弱的幼儿那里获取信息的策略 关于指控事件的时间进程和顺序。这项拟议的研究将决定(1)儿童如何 在虐待调查中被问及事件顺序，以及他们如何应对(2) 儿童的年龄、理解、工作记忆(WM)、注意力和情景记忆的差异 可能会影响他们准确回忆事件顺序的能力，以及(3)问题和儿童的反应 关于顺序影响符合陪审团资格的成年人理解和相信儿童的指控的可能性 滥用职权。这些目标将通过四个拟议项目来实现。在项目1中，研究小组将编写一个 581份法律文本样本，用于评估用于提问的提示中包含的排序内容 儿童证人讲述了他们被指控的虐待经历和儿童对 问题。特别令人感兴趣的是确定幼儿可能存在的模棱两可的情况。在项目2中 研究小组将对644名4至12岁的儿童进行实验室研究，以测试 儿童对虐待中发现的顺序问题反应中的认知和背景 案件记录。据预测，记忆和反应的偏差随着年龄的增长和 WM，当注意力分散时。在项目3中，研究小组将检查儿童对 对可能有歧义解释的问题进行排序。他们对问题意图的解释 预计会以可预测的方式随年龄和WM而变化。最后，在项目4中，研究小组将检查 模拟陪审员对排序问题和儿童反应的解释。来自美国各地的参与者。 (n=300)将对从项目1-3和项目3中选出的成人提问者和儿童受访者的可信度进行评级 模拟陪审员理解我们实验室的各种排序问题和答复的准确性 研究将会确定。拟议的工作是创新的，因为它代表了一种多维的方法 来考察不同顺序问题的认知、发展和语境适当性 在虐待调查中询问儿童，并确定这些问题可能在多大程度上 影响虐待案件的公正裁决。令人惊讶的是，这个主题被研究得不够，因为 对理解儿童顺序知识和记忆基础的实质性影响，以及 改善虐待儿童案件中与健康有关的法律结果。

Project Summary/Abstract Child maltreatment is widely recognized as a serious threat to children's well-being and health. In maltreatment cases, the fidelity and credibility of the child witness/victim's report is often critical to securing an outcome in the best interest of the child. Eliciting information from children about the time-course and sequence of alleged maltreatment is central in these cases. The field of child interviewing is actively debating how best to question children about sequence in these cases with little existing empirical research on which to draw. There is a pressing need to identify strategies for obtaining information from even young, cognitively vulnerable children about the time course and sequence of alleged events. The proposed research will determine (1) how children are questioned about event sequence, and how they respond, across age, in maltreatment investigations (2) how differences in children's age, comprehension, working memory (WM), attention, and episodic memory may impact their abilities to accurately recall event sequence, and (3) how questions and child responses about sequence impact the likelihood that jury-eligible adults' will understand and believe children's allegations of abuse. These aims will be achieved via four proposed projects. In Project 1, the research team will code a sample of 581 legal transcripts to assess the sequencing content included in the prompts used to question child witnesses about their alleged maltreatment experiences and confusion in children's responses to the questions. Of particular interest is identifying instances of potential ambiguity for young children. In Projects 2 and 3, the research team will conduct laboratory studies with 644 4- to 12-year-olds to test the roles of cognition and context in children's responses to sequencing questions like those identified in the maltreatment case transcripts. Memory and response biases are predicted to be most pronounced with decreasing age and WM, and when attention is divided. In Project 3, the research team will examine children's responses to sequencing questions with potentially ambiguous interpretations. Their interpretations of the questions' intent are expected to vary with age and WM in predictable ways. Finally, in Project 4 the research team will examine mock juror interpretations of sequencing questions and children's responses. Participants from across the U.S. (N = 300) will rate the credibility of adult questioners and child respondents selected from Projects 1-3 and the accuracy with which mock jurors understand various sequencing questions and responses from our laboratory studies will be determined. The proposed work is innovative in that it represents a multi-dimensional approach to examining the cognitive, developmental, and contextual appropriateness of varying sequencing questions asked of children in maltreatment investigations and determining the extent to which these questions may impact just decisions in maltreatment cases. This topic has been surprisingly understudied given the substantial implications for understanding the foundations of children's sequential knowledge and memory, and for improving health-relevant legal outcomes in cases of child maltreatment.