Rape cases have a disproportionately high attrition rate and low conviction rate compared to other criminal offenses. Evaluations of a rape complainant's credibility often determine whether a case progresses through the criminal justice system. Even though emotional demeanor is not related to witness honesty or accuracy, distressed rape complainants are perceived to be more credible than complainants who present with controlled affect. To understand the extent and robustness of the influence of emotional demeanor on credibility judgments of female adult rape complainants, we conducted a systematic review, metaanalysis and p-curve analysis of the experimental simulated decision-making literature on the influence of complainant emotional demeanor on complainant credibility. The meta-analysis included 20 studies with participants who were criminal justice professionals (e.g., police officers and judges), community members, and mock jurors (N = 3128). Results suggest that distressed demeanor significantly increased perceptions of complainant credibility, with a small to moderate effect size estimate. Importantly, the results of p-curve analysis suggest that reporting bias is not a likely explanation for the effect of emotional demeanor on rape complainant credibility. Sample type (whether perceivers were criminal justice professionals or prospective jurors) and stimulus modality (whether perceivers read about or watched the complainant recount the alleged rape) were not found to moderate the effect size estimate.These results suggest that effective methods of reducing reliance on emotional demeanor to make credibility judgments about rape complainants should be investigated to make credibility assessments fairer and more accurate.

Despite the effectiveness of parenting interventions in both prevention and intervention with child emotional and behavioural problems, parental participation in evidence-based programmes remains low, limiting the benefit to the population. This research examines a new population parental engagement strategy for parenting programmes using video testimonials via two studies. The first study compared the use of parent versus expert testimonials, against a no testimonial condition on parenting programme evaluations with 70 parents. The second study compared expert testimonials which were framed in a fear or non-fear context, with 73 parents. Results indicated no significant effect of source of testimonial or content of testimonial on parental evaluations of the programme or behavioural outcomes. Trends favoured expert testimonials over parent testimonials. Implications for population level engagement strategies are discussed.

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Jurors often negatively evaluate complainants making allegations of rape when those complainants were intoxicated at the time of the assault. It is, therefore, essential that legal practitioners have effective methods of ensuring that jurors use evidence of intoxication for the legally permissible purpose, which is to determine the complainant's cognitive capacity to consent. This study examines whether providing judicial instructions about how jurors should make use of complainant intoxication evidence assists jurors to use this evidence appropriately. University students ( N = 212) read a case synopsis of an Australian criminal trial in which the complainant described experiencing mild or moderate levels of cognitive impairment due to alcohol consumption. Participants were then given a standard instruction about using the evidence of the complainant's intoxication or one that provided an upper decision limit for determining complainant cognitive capacity (providing inference support). As expected, presenting evidence about the complainant's alcohol-impaired cognitive state attenuated participants' negative perceptions of the complainant. The judicial instructions also assisted participants as they evaluated a moderately intoxicated complainant as less capable of consenting when participants received an instruction that supported the correct inference to draw from the evidence compared to a standard instruction. However, parallel mediation analysis showed that rape schemas mediated the relationship between perceived complainant capacity to consent and perceptions of defendant guilt. Judicial instructions that support perceivers' inferences may assist participants to more appropriately evaluate information about complainants' intoxication, however problematically, rape schemas still influenced decisions about defendant guilt.