NCJ Number
158509
Journal
Psychology, Crime and Law Volume: 1 Dated: (1995) Pages: 283-290
Date Published
1995
Length
8 pages
Annotation
The relationship between intelligence, memory recall, and suggestibility during interrogation as proposed by Gudjonsson and Clark in 1986 was examined using data from 58 adolescent male offenders residing in a national children's center with security facilities in the United Kingdom.
Abstract
The participants had an average age of 15.5 years. The majority had unstable family backgrounds, major school difficulties, and problematic social relationships. They completed the Gudjonsson Suggestibility Scale and the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children. Results revealed that interrogative suggestibility correlated negatively with intelligence and recall memory. In addition, limited evidence existed of range effects for the relationship between intelligence and suggestibility, but not for the relationship between recall memory and suggestibility. Findings were broadly consistent with the findings of previous studies. The Gudjonsson Suggestibility Scale appears to provide important and significant information about some of the cognitive factors that appear to influence the extent to which an adolescent forensic population is susceptible to interrogative suggestibility. Adolescent suspects, witnesses, and crime victims who have lower intellectual abilities, such as those who the Wechsler scale would categorize as having a borderline mental disability or a mental disability, are likely to be more inherently more suggestible and therefore more vulnerable to giving false testimony or false confessions than others. Tables and 16 references