Improving the Effectiveness of Suspect Interrogations

Abstract

The past two decades of research on interrogation were spurred, in large part, by the specter of false confessions and the resulting miscarriages of justice. More recently, interest in the topic has been fueled by the need to develop evidence-based methods that improve the collection of diagnostic confession evidence and accurate intelligence from human sources. In this review, we update the research on false confessions and describe recent assessments of scientifically validated approaches for obtaining cooperation, eliciting confessions, and detecting deceit. Studies are summarized through the prism of accusatorial versus information-gathering approaches to interrogation: The former rely on psychological manipulation and control-based methods, whereas the latter focus on developing rapport and cooperation to elicit an account that can be strategically addressed via evidence presentation. The review concludes with recommendations for additional research to further improve the effectiveness of interrogations across a variety of contexts.