Does implying peer knowledge during an interview promote truthful disclosures from peer disclosure recipients and witnesses?

Abstract

We tested a novel implied peer knowledge paradigm in which both child witnesses and child recipients (children who previously received a disclosure from a witness) were able to infer, with varying degrees of saliency, the likelihood that an adult interviewer would hear about a negative transgression from a peer and adjust their disclosure strategy accordingly. We tracked children’s disclosures (N = 418; aged 6-12 years; M_age = 8.91 years, SD = 1.37) across two interviews and found that providing a verbal notice of implied knowledge to child disclosure recipients (not child witnesses) that a peer who had previously disclosed to them would also be talking to an adult increased their disclosure rates. This study adds to a small body of work examining patterns of disclosure transmissions from witnesses to peers to adults, which is frequently observed in situations of child sexual abuse.

Acknowledgments

The authors thank the Educating Youth in Engineering and Science Camp at the University of Regina, Alyssa Adams, Mackenzie Furlong, Ava Bowns, Benjamin Katz, the many research assistants and volunteers and camp Counselors who assisted with data collection, transcribing and coding, as well as the parents and children for their participation in the research.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 A smaller number of children were assigned to this condition as we were not interested in the honesty promotion manipulations on Day 2 for children in the initial adult interviews but rather a direct comparison between the child witness who disclosed to a peer versus an adult on Day 1 (see Figure 1).

2 These 12 interviewers were from the same pool as Day 1 adult interviewers, but no child received the same adult interviewer for both interviews.

3 Recall that Interview 2 included a structured approach not present in Interview 1 which, relative to Interview 1, likely increased the time to disclosure.

4 Note that 14 peer interviewers who did not receive a disclosure from a child witness on Day 1 (while we were monitoring the conversations) went on to disclose the transgression to an adult on Day 2. These were excluded from the recipient group.

5 Interview 2 included a structured approach not present in Interview 1 which, relative to Interview 1, likely increased the time to disclosure.

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported by the Luther College President’s Research Fund at the University of Regina to K. C. Bruer, Canada Research Chair funding to H. L. Price, and funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council for both H. L. Price and A. D. Evans.