Based on the finding that deceptive and misleading interrogation techniques are not uncommon, we investigated to what extent participants may be blind to alterations introduced to their accounts of past transgressions. Drawing from the source-monitoring framework, we hypothesized that participants' truthfulness and whether they had committed a transgression in the past (transgression history) would be predictive of blindness. When filling out a questionnaire about their past transgressions, 80 participants fabricated some of their answers. Prior to an interview 1 week later, two previously fabricated and two truthful answers were covertly altered by the experimenter. We found substantial blindness rates, and, as hypothesized, blindness was more pronounced for (1) fabricated than truthful responses and (2) alterations with transgression history compared with no transgression history. Possible consequences may include the creation of guilt presumption and increasing pressure to obtain a confession. Both can be hazardous for suspects and the legal decision-making process.

Expert witnesses and scholars sometimes disagree on whether suggestibility and compliance are related to people's tendency to falsely confess. Hence, the principal aim of this review was to amass the available evidence on the link between suggestibility and compliance and false confessions. We reviewed experimental data in which false confessions were experimentally evoked and suggestibility and compliance were measured. Furthermore, we reviewed field data of potential false confessions and their relationship with suggestibility and compliance. These diverse databases converge to the same conclusion. We unequivocally found that high levels of suggestibility (and to a lesser extent compliance) were associated with an increased vulnerability to falsely confess. Suggestibility measurements might be informative for expert witnesses who must evaluate the false confession potential in legal cases.

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Misguided beliefs and practices among law enforcement officers can have detrimental effects, as they can lead to false confessions and wrongful convictions (e.g., . Indeed, false confessions are among the major causes of wrongful convictions in the US (Drizin & Leo, 2004; Innocence Project, n.d.; National Registry of Exonerations, n.d.). Therefore, the question whether police officers' practices and beliefs align with the empirical evidence is crucial, and the examination of these practices and beliefs may suggest specific areas where the police are in need of training or education. Kassin et al. (2007) conducted a survey to examine North American (N = 631) police investigators' views and practices regarding suspect interviews and interrogation. However, little is known about European police officers' views and practices. Based on the original questionnaire by Kassin et al. (2007), we surveyed