False Confessions in the Lab: A Review

Rassin, Eric; Israëls, Han

doi:10.5553/elr.000019

Cited by 6 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 8 publications

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“…Both real-world cases and experimental research suggest that persuasion-based approaches are effective in generating confessions from suspects without having an overtly physical component (King & Snook, 2009; Meissner et al, 2014). The concern regarding the reliability of confessions remains, however, as such psychologically based tactics have also been implicated in convincing innocent suspects to confess falsely (Kassin & Gudjonsson, 2004; Rassin & Israëls, 2014; Russano, Meissner, Narchet, & Kassin, 2005). In recognition of this fact, a recent large scale survey of experts on the psychology of confessions found that they agreed uniformly that false confessions can be increased by minimization and false evidence ploys—two commonly used police tactics (Kassin et al, 2018).…”

Section: Perceptions Of Police Interrogationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

An exploration of laypeople’s perceptions of confession evidence and interrogation tactics.

Hall¹,

Eastwood²,

Clow³

2020

Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science / Revue canadienne des

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For a confession to be admitted as evidence, the confession must be voluntary, procured when a suspect is aware of his or her right to silence and counsel, and the methods that obtained the confession should not shock the conscience of the public. We conducted 3 studies on samples of Canadian citizens to begin to examine what the public does or does not find inappropriate in the context of police interrogations. Findings suggest that overtly coercive tactics are viewed as less appropriate than psychologically manipulative tactics. Crime severity and evidence strength influenced these perceptions. Of the psychologically manipulative tactics, only police lying about evidence appeared particularly negative to participants. The findings are discussed in the context of confession evidence admissibility and the possible implications for false confessions. Public Significance StatementA key aspect for determining the admissibility of confession evidence includes deciding whether or not the practices used to obtain a confession "shock the conscience" of the public. We found that the perceived appropriateness of a police interrogation tactic differed based on the severity of the crime and evidence of guilt. Thus, laypeople's subjective perceptions of police practices are not fixed, and seem unlikely to protect the rights of suspects, facilitate due process, or reduce miscarriages of justice.

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Section: Perceptions Of Police Interrogationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

An exploration of laypeople’s perceptions of confession evidence and interrogation tactics.

Hall¹,

Eastwood²,

Clow³

2020

Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science / Revue canadienne des

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“…This confirms that a confession remains a strong piece of evidence in decision makers' perception. By contrast, experimental research suggests that confession evidence is not that strong, because innocent individuals can be brought to confess to a crime quite easily (see for overviews, Kassin, 2005;Rassin & Israëls, 2014).…”

Section: No Psychopathy Psychopathymentioning

confidence: 99%

Initial evidence for the assimilation hypothesis

Rassin

2017

Psychology, Crime & Law

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The assimilation hypothesis dictates that knowledge of prior evidence makes legal decision makers assign more weight to subsequent evidence. For example, the evidentiary power of a line-up identification is perceived to be stronger if the decision maker knows that the suspect has confessed, compared to when knowledge of the confession is absent. In three studies, the assimilation hypothesis was tested. As expected, knowledge of DNA-evidence inflated the estimated strength of subsequent eyewitness identification evidence (Study 1), and also inflated overall conviction and conviction rate (Study 2). A similar assimilation effect was found with knowledge of the suspect's dangerous psychopathology (i.e. psychopathic and antisocial personality traits). Such knowledge inflated the estimated strength of fingerprint evidence. In conclusion, the assimilation effect is a threat to rational legal decision making in both lays (Study 2) and professional judges (Studies 1 and 3).

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“…One reason for this is that false confessions are a prominent source of wrongful convictions (Kassin, 2017). Although some scholars have asserted that there are important individual differences that might impact people's willingness to confess to a crime that they did not commit (e.g., Gudjonsson, 2010Gudjonsson, , 2018, other scholars have argued that individual differences do not play a significant role in the susceptibility to form false confessions (Israëls, 2011;Mergaerts, 2019;Rassin & Israëls, 2014).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The link between suggestibility, compliance, and false confessions: A review using experimental and field studies

Otgaar

Schell-Leugers

Howe

et al. 2021

Applied Cognitive Psychology

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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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False Confessions in the Lab: A Review

Cited by 6 publications

References 8 publications

An exploration of laypeople’s perceptions of confession evidence and interrogation tactics.

An exploration of laypeople’s perceptions of confession evidence and interrogation tactics.

Initial evidence for the assimilation hypothesis

The link between suggestibility, compliance, and false confessions: A review using experimental and field studies

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