NCJ Number
176176
Journal
Child Abuse & Neglect Volume: 23 Issue: 1 Dated: January 1999 Pages: 91-98
Date Published
1999
Length
8 pages
Annotation
The objective of the case study reported in this paper was to examine the accuracy of one child's account of a sexually abusive incident; the availability of an audio recording of the last in a series of abusive incidents enabled the researchers to assess accuracy in good detail.
Abstract
Content analysis of the interview involved quantitative and qualitative evaluations of the victim's account and a qualitative assessment of eliciting utterances. A criteria-based content analysis (CBCA) was performed on the victim's account to assess its purported credibility. Findings indicated that more than 50 percent of the informative details provided by the victim were corroborated by the audio recording account, of which 98 percent were central (allegation related) and 64 percent were confirmed by more than one source (audio recording suspect-witness). Ten CBCA criteria were presented in the victim's free narrative account of the last abusive incident. The authors conclude children can provide remarkably detailed and accurate accounts of their experiences. 44 references and 1 table