‘Does the jury really need to hear it all?’: The effect of evidence presentation practice on jury assessment of children's eyewitness testimony

This research provided an analysis of whether the presentation of a rapport stage
to ‘jury’ members would influence their assessment of the quality and veracity of the
subsequent testimony elicited. Three hundred and twenty-three participants aged
between 18 and 78 years took part. Participants read a mock transcript of an
investigative interview transcript and then completed a questionnaire with
questions designed to test their assessment of the child, the interview, and the
likely case progression. The transcript was manipulated so that participants were
either presented with the rapport stage in full, or were merely told that the rapport
stage had been conducted. There were further manipulations of child age (4 or 6
years) and child gender. There was a single main effect of rapport stage
presentation (pB.001). Presentation of the rapport stage led to an enhanced
participant assessment of child honesty and understanding, interviewer fairness
and professionalism, and the likelihood that the alleged perpetrator would go to
court and receive a custodial sentence. The results suggested that the practice of
editing children’s testimony for presentation in court should be conducted
consistently; either all rapport stages should be presented in full (recommended),
or all rapport stages should be omitted.