Children's Eyewitness Testimony and Event Memory (Elements in Child Development)

By: Martha E. Arterberry

Sign Up Now! Already a Member? Log In
You must be logged into Bookshare to access this title. Learn about membership options, or view our freely available titles.

Synopsis: This Element addresses the factors that influence children's accuracy in reporting on events and draws implications for children's ability to serve as reliable eyewitnesses. This Element focusses on short- and long-term memory for event details, memory for stressful events, memory for the temporal order of events, memory for the spatial location of events, the ways poorly worded questions or intervening events interfere with memory, and individual differences in language development, understanding right from wrong and emotions, and cognitive processes. In addition, this Element considers how potential jurors perceive children as eyewitnesses and how the findings of the research on children's event memory inform best practices for interviewing children.