TY - JOUR
T1 - “Did You Ever Fight Back?” Jurors’ Questions to Children Testifying in Criminal Trials About Alleged Sexual Abuse
AU - St. George, Suzanne
AU - Garcia-Johnson, Anastacia
AU - Denne, Emily
AU - Stolzenberg, Stacia N.
N1 - Funding Information:
This project was funded by an Early Career Program in the Social & Behavioral Sciences award to Dr. Stacia N. Stolzenberg from the National Institute of Justice (2016-R2-CX-0050), as well as grant HD087685 from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. A portion of the data in this manuscript was presented in Anastacia Garcia-Johnson’s MS thesis.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 International Association for Correctional and Forensic Psychology.
PY - 2020/8/1
Y1 - 2020/8/1
N2 - The current study examined jurors’ questions to children in criminal trials assessing children’s allegations of sexual abuse, demonstrating a new avenue for studying how jurors think about, respond to, and assess evidence. We used qualitative content analysis to examine jurors’ questions to 134, 5- to 17-year-olds alleging sexual abuse in criminal trial testimonies. Five themes emerged: abuse interactions, contextual details of abuse, children’s reactions to abuse, children’s (delayed) disclosure, and case background details. Jurors often ask about abuse dynamics, the context surrounding abuse, and children’s disclosure processes, reflecting common misconceptions about child sexual abuse (CSA), such as whether it is credible to delay disclosure or maintain contact with an alleged perpetrator. This study improves our understanding of how jurors understand and evaluate children’s reports of alleged CSA, suggesting that jurors may struggle to understand children’s reluctance.
AB - The current study examined jurors’ questions to children in criminal trials assessing children’s allegations of sexual abuse, demonstrating a new avenue for studying how jurors think about, respond to, and assess evidence. We used qualitative content analysis to examine jurors’ questions to 134, 5- to 17-year-olds alleging sexual abuse in criminal trial testimonies. Five themes emerged: abuse interactions, contextual details of abuse, children’s reactions to abuse, children’s (delayed) disclosure, and case background details. Jurors often ask about abuse dynamics, the context surrounding abuse, and children’s disclosure processes, reflecting common misconceptions about child sexual abuse (CSA), such as whether it is credible to delay disclosure or maintain contact with an alleged perpetrator. This study improves our understanding of how jurors understand and evaluate children’s reports of alleged CSA, suggesting that jurors may struggle to understand children’s reluctance.
KW - CSA misconceptions
KW - child sexual abuse
KW - children’s testimony
KW - jurors’questions
KW - jury decision-making
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85087730034&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=85087730034&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1177/0093854820935960
DO - 10.1177/0093854820935960
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85087730034
SN - 0093-8548
VL - 47
SP - 1032
EP - 1054
JO - Criminal Justice and Behavior
JF - Criminal Justice and Behavior
IS - 8
ER -