title: Interviewing strategically to elicit admissions from guilty suspects.
abstract: In this article we introduce a novel interviewing tactic to elicit admissions from guilty suspects. By influencing the suspects' perception of the amount of evidence the interviewer holds against them, we aimed to shift the suspects' counterinterrogation strategies from less to more forthcoming. The proposed tactic (SUE-Confrontation) is a development of the Strategic Use of Evidence (SUE) framework and aims to affect the suspects' perception by confronting them with statement-evidence inconsistencies. Participants (N = 90) were asked to perform several mock criminal tasks before being interviewed using 1 of 3 interview techniques: (a) SUE-Confrontation, (b) Early Disclosure of Evidence, or (c) No Disclosure of Evidence. As predicted, the SUE-Confrontation interview generated more statement-evidence inconsistencies from suspects than the Early Disclosure interview. Importantly, suspects in the SUE-Confrontation condition (vs. Early and No disclosure conditions) admitted more self-incriminating information and also perceived the interviewer to have had more information about the critical phase of the crime (the phase where the interviewer lacked evidence). The findings show the adaptability of the SUE-technique and how it may be used as a tool for eliciting admissions.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology.
authors.forename: Serra
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Tekin
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology.
authors.forename: Pär Anders
authors.initials: PA
authors.lastname: Granhag
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology.
authors.forename: Leif
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Strömwall
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology.
authors.forename: Erik Mac
authors.initials: EM
authors.lastname: Giolla
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Portsmouth.
authors.forename: Aldert
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Vrij
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, City University of New York.
authors.forename: Maria
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Hartwig
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D057237:Criminals / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006167:Guilt; D006801:Humans; D007407:Interviews as Topic; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D013637:Tape Recording; D014342:Truth Disclosure; D055815:Young Adult