Investigative empathy: a strength scale of empathy based on European police perspectives

Baker-Eck, Bianca; Bull, Ray; Walsh, David

doi:10.1080/13218719.2020.1751333

Cited by 15 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 41 publications

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“…The complex nature of empathy found by Baker-Eck et al ( 2020) could be an explanation as to why investigative empathy as a term has not been differentiated from other types of empathy and why many have not clearly defined investigative empathy, despite its recognition and importance (Oxburgh & Ost, 2011). In the current literature there are merely indirect definitions of empathy but a comprehensive, operational, and measurable definition is missing (see Baker-Eck et al, 2020;Bull and Baker, 2019;Bull & Cherryman, 1996;Oxburgh et al, 2014;Oxburgh, Ost, & Cherryman, 2012;Rollnick & Miller, 1995). The current study aims to examine the types of empathy employed in suspect interviews conducted by highly qualified and highly PEACE-trained investigators in England.…”

Section: Empathy Research In Investigative Interviewingmentioning

confidence: 97%

“…These definitions included "openness", "listening", "non-judgment", "understanding" (current situation), "working together", "changing perspectives", "building rapport", "understanding actions", and "appreciating emotions and/or distress." Baker-Eck et al (2020) distinguished between cognitive and affective empathy and between direct versus indirect forms, as the affective/emotional type may not be conducive for investigative interviews, particularly because of the possibility of losing oversight of the current objectives. Cognitive empathy was described as a rational type of empathy allowing for understanding on a non/emotional level, whereas affective empathy was deemed emotional, such as experiencing similar feelings as the interviewee.…”

Section: Empathy Research In Investigative Interviewingmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…As none of the empathic displays involved an emotional/affective component, all types of empathy found in the present study were forms of cognitive nature. Indeed, Baker-Eck et al (2020) contended that appropriate empathic types within an investigative interview should be cognitive rather than affective, and they found that all of the English interviewers defined empathy only in a cognitive way.…”

Section: Coding Strategymentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

What to Reveal and what to Conceal? An Empirical Examination of Guilty Suspects’ Strategies

Srivatsav¹,

Tj²,

Pa³

et al. 2019

Preprint

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With Study 1 (N=140), we aimed to examine how different ways of disclosing evidence during an interview would influence guilty suspects’ perception of interviewer’s prior knowledge and elicit statement-evidence inconsistencies. We predicted that interviews with evidence disclosed would elicit low statement-evidence inconsistencies whereas interviews where evidence was not disclosed would result in high statement-evidence inconsistencies. The outcome did not support our predictions. Guilty suspects revealed crime-related information about non-critical themes and withheld information regarding critical themes irrespective of evidence disclosure. We explored this unexpected finding in Study 2 (N=216), which was designed to understand if guilty suspects would reveal information regarding themes of the crime that are not incriminating (not critical) in comparison to themes that were incriminating (critical) as observed in Study 1. We used the evidence disclosure tactics of Study 1 in Study 2 and also measured how these influence their perception of interviewer’s knowledge. The outcome replicated findings from Study 1 that guilty suspects reveal or withhold information based on the cost of disclosing the information. This is a novel finding in the Strategic Use of Evidence literature.

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Section: Empathy Research In Investigative Interviewingmentioning

confidence: 97%

Section: Empathy Research In Investigative Interviewingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Coding Strategymentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

What to Reveal and what to Conceal? An Empirical Examination of Guilty Suspects’ Strategies

Srivatsav¹,

Tj²,

Pa³

et al. 2019

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…The findings of the present study may therefore provide insight into how to further enhance the likelihood of suspects (the majority of whom do not keep silent, after all) providing relevant information. As for silent suspects, and how they can be motivated to start talking, concepts such as rapport (Alison et al., 2013; Walsh & Bull, 2012) or empathy (Baker‐Eck et al., 2020, 2021) may also be important.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A free account or not? Its effect upon information yield in strategic interviews with suspects

Beek

Bull

Mijalkovic

2022

Journal Invest Psychology

Self Cite

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Asking suspects for a free account (FA) at the start of an interview is considered good practice in a growing number of police organisations, whereas in others it still is not commonplace. This study explored whether interviews with or without such an invitation yielded more information from guilty suspects. Students in safety and security committed a mock crime and were then interviewed using a strategy of gradual disclosure of evidence, in the experimental condition preceded with an FA invitation (n = 20) and without such an invitation in the control condition (n = 17). On average, relatively little information was collected in the FA phase and far more in the subsequent gradual disclosure phase. However, the FA condition yielded seven confessions, four of which were given already in the FA phase. The No FA condition yielded only two confessions. Other differences in yield were not found. These findings indicate that an FA invitation could lead to some relevant and important information, such as a confession, being gathered already at an early stage of an interview, and that such an invitation does not hamper the gathering of further information later in the interview.

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“…In investigative interview contexts rapport-building behaviours are generally thought to be verbal, facial, and physical in nature. Examples include active listening (smiling, nodding, & uh-huh), immediacy behaviours (eye contact & leaning forward), self-disclosure (Abbe & Brandon, 2014 ), tone of voice and empathy (e.g., Baker-Eck et al, 2020 ; Dando & Oxburgh, 2016 ; Griffiths & Rachlew, 2018 ; Jakobsen, 2021 ), and personalising the interview (Fisher & Geiselman, 1992 ). Indeed, professional training materials and guidance for conducting interviews with witnesses emphasize and describe various rapport-building behaviours.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Interviewing in virtual environments: Towards understanding the impact of rapport-building behaviours and retrieval context on eyewitness memory

et al. 2022

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Given the complexities of episodic memory and necessarily social nature of in-person face-to-face interviews, theoretical and evidence-based techniques for collecting episodic information from witnesses, victims, and survivors champion rapport-building. Rapport is believed to reduce some of the social demands of recalling an experienced event in an interview context, potentially increasing cognitive capacity for remembering. Cognitive and social benefits have also emerged in remote interview contexts with reduced anxiety and social pressure contributing to improved performance. Here, we investigated episodic memory in mock-eyewitness interviews conducted in virtual environments (VE) and in-person face-to-face (FtF), where rapport-building behaviours were either present or absent. Main effects revealed when rapport was present and where interviews were conducted in a VE participants recalled more correct event information, made fewer errors and were more accurate. Moreover, participants in the VE plus rapport-building present condition outperformed participants in all other conditions. Feedback indicated both rapport and environment were important for reducing the social demands of a recall interview, towards supporting effortful remembering. Our results add to the emerging literature on the utility of virtual environments as interview spaces and lend further support to the importance of prosocial behaviours in applied contexts.

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Investigative empathy: a strength scale of empathy based on European police perspectives

Abstract: Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. Data protection guidelines of the General Data Protection Act have been followed and all data remains anonymous. Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

Cited by 15 publications

References 41 publications

What to Reveal and what to Conceal? An Empirical Examination of Guilty Suspects’ Strategies

What to Reveal and what to Conceal? An Empirical Examination of Guilty Suspects’ Strategies

A free account or not? Its effect upon information yield in strategic interviews with suspects

Interviewing in virtual environments: Towards understanding the impact of rapport-building behaviours and retrieval context on eyewitness memory

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