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ABSTRACT
In this review, we describe a shift that has taken place in the area of developmental suggestibility. Formerly, studies in this area indicated that there were pronounced age-related differences in suggestibility, with preschool children being particularly susceptible to misleading suggestions. The studies on which this conclusion was based were criticized on several grounds (e.g. unrealistic scenarios, truncated age range). Newer studies that have addressed these criticisms, however, have largely confirmed the earlier conclusions. These studies indicate that preschool children are disproportionately vulnerable to a variety of suggestive influences. There do not appear to any strict boundary conditions to this conclusion, and preschool children will sometimes succumb to suggestions about bodily touching, emotional events, and participatory events. The evidence for this assertion is presented in this review.
KEY WORDS: interviewer bias, eyewitness testimony, development
INTRODUCTION
In the 1980s, there was an enormous change in society's sensitivity to and recognition of the problems of violence and abuse that were suffered by children. Spurred by an increased awareness of the pervasiveness of child sexual abuse, state after state revised its criminal procedures to enable prosecutors to deal more effectively with victims and defendants. This led to important changes in the legal system, not only in the United States but also in other countries in the western world. These changes included allowing children to provide uncorroborated testimony in cases concerning sexual abuse-a crime that by its very nature often does not involve an eyewitness other than the perpetrator and the victim-and the elimination of the competency requirement for child witnesses. (For a description of these changes, see Bottoms & Goodman 1996; Davies et al 1995; Goodman et al 1992b; McGough 1994.) With a relaxation of standards, there has come an increase in the number of children who provide statements in legal cases. At the beginning of this decade, we estimated that over 13,000 children testified each year in sexual abuse cases (Ceci & Bruck 1993), and many thousands more gave depositions and unsworn statements to judges, law enforcement officials, and social workers. Additionally, a large number of civil and family court cases entailed allegations of sexual impropriety involving a child. Hence, the question of whether children's reports are reliable has taken on added significance in...