Measuring Reading Complexity and Listening Comprehension of Canadian Police Cautions

Abstract

The reading complexity and listening comprehension of Canadian police cautions were measured. In Study 1, the complexity of 44 unique Canadian police cautions was assessed using five readability measures (Flesch-Kincaid reading level, sentence complexity, use of difficult words, use of infrequent words, and number of words). Results showed that 7 (37%) of the rightto-silence cautions (n = 19) and none of the right-to-legal-counsel cautions (n = 25) reached acceptable cutoff levels for all five measures. In Study 2, university students (N = 121) were presented with one of three cautions verbally and were asked to explain its meaning. Despite variations in complexity across the three cautions, participants understood approximately one third of the information contained in the cautions. The extent to which the needs of Canadian suspects and police organizations are being met and the validity of reading complexity as a predictor of listening comprehension are discussed.

A Descriptive Analysis of How Canadian Police Officers Administer the Right-to-Silence and Right-to-Legal-Counsel Cautions

“…Nevertheless, we believe that verifying understanding is sound practice because it allows interviewers to identify the aspects of the cautions that suspects do not understand and that are in need of explanation. Furthermore, our finding that the interviewers always explained the rights correctly on the few occasions when they attempted to explain the various rights contained in the cautions is encouraging because it appears that they understand the caution themselves and therefore have the ability to help suspects and accused persons to understand the information that is contained in an inherently complex caution (Eastwood, Snook, and Chaulk 2010).…”

Safeguarding Youth Interrogation Rights: The Effect of Grade Level and Reading Complexity of Youth Waiver Forms on the Comprehension of Legal Rights

“…Results showed that the students recalled, on average, 40% of their legal rights, and only 22% of the youths comprehended more than 50% of their rights. It should be noted that this issue is not unique to youth populations, as similar low levels of comprehension have been discovered with adult cautions as well (Cloud, Shepherd, NodvinBarkoff, & Shur, 2002: Eastwood, Snook, & Chaulk, 2010Fenner, Gudjonsson, & Clare, 2002;Gudjonsson, 1991).…”

Juvenile Miranda Warnings

“…It is important to note its criterion for establishing grade levels is set at 75% or greater comprehension; typically one to two grades higher are needed for full (90% to 100%) comprehension (DuBay, 2004). The Flesch-Kincaid correlates well with standardized reading tests and is commonly used in Miranda-related research (e.g., Eastwood, Snook, & Chaulk, 2010;Helms, 2003Helms, , 2007 and the study of informed consent more generally (Paasche-Orlow, Taylor, & Brancati, 2003).…”