Detecting Deception Flashcards
What are the 4 types of analysis used when detecting deception from VERBAL content?
- Statement Validity Analysis
- Reality Monitoring
- Scientific Content Analysis
- Verifiable Detail Approach
What does Statement Validity Analysis involve?
A procedure used to assess the veracity (truthfulness, accuracy) of written statements typically made by children in alleged child sexual abuse cases.
Often no evidence.
Used as evidence in criminal courts in several Western European countries.
There are 4 elements to it:
- Case-file analysis
- Interview
- Criteria-based content analysis
- Evaluation of the CBCA outcome (validity checklist)
What are the four elements of Statement Validity Analysis?
- Case-file analysis
- Interview
- Criteria-based content analysis
- Evaluation of the CBCA outcome (validity checklist)
What is Case-file analysis?
An element of the Statement Validity Analysis Process.
Information is gathered about issues such as: the child’s age, cognitive abilities, previous statements, time interval between the event and the statement and the relationship between the other parties.
Case-file analysis gives guidance on which aspects should be focused on in the interview.
Describe the interview process of SVA.
Good questioning is difficult with children as they volunteer little information and they can be suggestive.
Only specialised, trained individuals can interview children.
When the correct questions are asked, a good reflective account can be heard.
What does CBCA stand for?
Criteria-Based Content Analysis.
What is Criteria-Based Content Analysis?
An element of the Statement Validity Analysis Process.
A statement derived from memory of an actual event differs in content and quality from a statement based on invention or fantasy.
There are 19 CBCA criteria.
“Too difficult to make up” comes under cognitive criteria.
“Trying to avoid raising suspicion” comes under motivational criteria.
What are some of the Criteria-Based Content Analysis (CBCA) criteria?
Logical Unstructured Quantity Contextual Interactions Reproduction Unexpected Unusual Superfluous Misunderstood Spontaneous Corrections Raising doubts Self-deprecation Pardoning perpetrator
Describe the Validity Checklist aspect of CBCA.
CBCA scores can be affected by factors other than veracity of the statement.
- age
- coaching
- susceptibility to suggestion
- poor interview style
- inappropriateness of affect
- inconsistency with the laws of nature
- inconsistency with other statements
What are the problems with the validity statement?
- difficulty in determining the impact of factors
- difficulty in identifying factors
- difficulty in measuring factors
- justification of factors
- some revenant factors are missing
The validity checklist might be improperly used, and too often a CBCA score is considered as an accurate reflection of veracity (Gumbert & Lindblad, 1999)
What are the legal implications of the CBCA?
There are 5 criteria to be met to be accepted as evidence in US criminal courts.
- Is the scientific hypothesis testable?
- Has the proposition been tested?
- Is there a known error rate?
- Has the technique been subjected to peer review and publication?
- Is the theory upon which the technique is based generally accepted in the appropriate scientific community?
- Yes. Although mainly conducted in labs.
- Yes. Mostly in labs with adults rather than children.
- CBCA - 30%
- Yes
- No
Provide a conclusion on Statement Validity Analysis (SVA)
SVA evaluations do not meet the criteria typically set for admitting expert scientific evidence in US criminal courts.
If SVA assessments are not used, what to use?
(SVA experts have an impact on juries)
In those countries, where it is accepted in criminal courts, at the very least, SVA experts should present the problems and limitations.
Might be valuable tool for police investigations.
Who are the researchers behind Reality Monitoring?
Johnson and Raye, 1981.
What is reality monitoring?
A means of detecting deception from verbal content.
Memories of real experiences are obtained through perceptual processes and are therefore likely to contain perceptual information (sound, taste, touch, visual) and contextual information (info about location and time).
Memories about imagined events are derived from internal sources and are therefore likely to contain cognitive operations such as thoughts and reasonings.
In 2008, Vrij provided support for reality monitoring.
Provide a conclusion on Reality Monitoring.
RM is far easier to apply than CBCA and as accurate as CBCA.
However, there are two restrictions in using RM.
It cannot be used when people talk about an event that happened a long time ago. Over time cognitive operations may replace true memory of details, and over time imagined memories become more vivid as people start to imagine what may have happened.
Who is behind Scientific Content Analysis?
Sapir.
Describe Scientific Content Analysis.
It is used all over the world. Used by FBI, US Army, CIA and others. In 2006, reported by practitioners as the most used tool (Vrij)
Interviewees are requested to write down their activities during a certain period of time (e.g. What did you do last night between 6 and 9pm?)
SCAN experts analyse the statements using an unknown number of criteria.
What does the SCAN criteria include?
Denial of allegations, social introduction, lack of conviction or memory, structure of the statement, emotions, objective or subjective time, missing info, change in language, pronouns.
Describe some evidence supporting SCAN.
In 1994, Driscoll analysed 30 statements (before polygraph) and found SCAN had high accuracy rates. There was no mention of how many observers coded the statements. No ground truth (Driscoll also stated this was a limitation). No control group of non-experts included.
Describe some evidence criticising SCAN.
Nahari, Vrij & Fisher (2012).
61 liars and truth tellers wrote down their activities during the last 30 minutes. Statements were analysed with RM and SCAN.
RM obtained 71% accuracy whereas SCAN didn’t perform above the level of chance (50%)
Provide a conclusion on SCAN.
It has a lack of empirical support and lack of standardisation in the use of SCAN. There is no theoretical underpinning, it is unclear as to why differences would occur between truth tellers and liars. Some criteria are the same as CBCA but with opposite prediction. CBCA prediction receives support.
Describe the verifiable detail approach.
(Nahari, Vrij & Fisher, 2014)
On the one hand, liars want to be detailed because it sounds convincing. On the other hand, liars do not want to reveal evidence. Liars avoid mentioning details that can be verified (phone calls).
In their study, truth tellers went about their own business for 30 minutes. Liars stole an exam paper from an office and were asked not to mention it, but to pretend they went about their normal business for 30 mins instead.
Pps wrote down their statements and some wrote down who they were with (that can be verified) and activities that were recorded on CCTV and activities with technology that can be traced (credit cards, phone) or they just wrote down what they did.
Verifiable Detail Approach - accuracy rate = 72%
Then, same study but participants told the interviewer will check whether detail can be verified. Rate went up.
Sometimes suspects will ask others to lie and give them an alibi (Ian Huntley & Maxine Carr)
A technique is to ask suspect to provide evidence proving they were with the other person. Pairs task, accuracy = 88%
Compare the verifiable detail approach with criteria-based content analysis and reality monitoring.
VA is less sensitive to countermeasures.
All 3 have similar accuracy rates.
VA could help truth tellers as it gives them opportunity to make stories more convincing.
VA focusses on evidence, which is the strongest cue for lie detection.
VA focusses on what happens outside the interview room (the evidence)
Can we introduce interview styles that enhance differences between liars and truth tellers?
Interview protocols based on anxiety and cognitive load.
What is anxiety based interviewing?
Asking questions that will make liars more anxious or nervous than truth tellers.
There is no theoretical basis that it works (National Research Council. 2003)
Most interview protocols are anxiety based (control question technique, behaviour analysis interview)
What is the cognitive load interview style?
Ask questions that are more difficult to answer for liars than truth tellers. There are 3 options:
- Imposing cognitive load: make the interview more challenging.
- Encourage interviewees to say more.
- Unexpected questions: ask questions that liars haven’t anticipated.
What makes lying more difficult?
Story telling, self-presentation, monitoring, requires a justification, reminding themselves to role play, inhibition of the truth, automatic activation of the truth, lying is deliberate.
When is lying more difficult?
When someone has a clear memory of the truth and when they lack motivation to lie.
