Five considerations about memory processes for child investigative interviewers

Abstract

In cases of child abuse, children are required to retrieve details from their memory as accurately as possible. Previous research has shown that children’s memory reports can be heavily influenced by an interviewer, but many interviewers do not understand memory processes or know how their practices impact children’s memories. While interviewers are commonly recommended to adhere to expert guidelines, the current article aims to explain the memory-related reasons underlying why some interview practices are recommended and further aims to dispel some misconceptions about memory. Five considerations about children’s memory are described: (1) the rate that details are forgotten from memory cannot justify rushed interview planning, (2) considerations for eliciting details from different subsystems of long-term memory, (3) how question phrasing impacts children’s memory retrieval processes, (4) the inaccuracies caused by the reconstructive nature of memory, and (5) the memory challenges for children reporting multiple incidents of abuse.