Strategic Sequences in Police Interviews and the Importance of Order and Cultural Fit

Abstract

This study introduces the concept of strategic sequences to police interviews and concentrates on the impact of active listening behavior and rational arguments. To test the authors' central assumption that the effectiveness of strategic sequences is dependent on cultural fit (i.e., the match with the cultural background of suspects), young people participated in virtual police interviews. Study 1 demonstrated that contrast sequences accentuating rational rather than relational behavior were found to be effective in eliciting information and admissions from suspects originating from cultures that tend to use more direct and content-oriented communication (i.e., low-context cultures), whereas for suspects from cultures that use more indirect and context-oriented communication (i.e., high-context cultures) a nonsignificant trend in reversed order was found. Study 2 added the investigation of the joint impact of active listening and rational arguments. In line with predictions, the results showed that an active listening-rational arguments sequence is most effective when active listening behavior precedesrather than follows-rational arguments.A great deal of empirical and theoretical attention has been focused on police officers' skills and their effectiveness for interviewing suspects (

The cultural dimension of uncertainty avoidance impacts police–civilian interaction.

“…Lee, Adair, and Seo (2013) demonstrated that negotiators who engaged in cultural perspective taking prior to Uncertainty Avoidance in Negotiation 7 interaction claimed more value from the negotiation than those who did not. Similarly, Beune, Giebels, Adair, Fennis, and Van der Zee (2011) found that behavioral sequences accentuating rational rather than relational behavior were more effective in eliciting information from perpetrators with a cultural preference for direct communication compared to perpetrators with a preference for indirect context-orientated communication. Contextualizing these findings to the current research suggests that alignment will occur more naturally in interactions where police negotiators are interacting with perpetrators from their own culture.…”

“…Similar patterns have been found in the field of police interviews. Beune et al (2011) found that individualistic Uncertainty Avoidance in Negotiation 8 perpetrators are more cooperative when confronted with rational rather than relational strategies, with a reversed pattern for collectivistic perpetrators.…”

Communication error management in law enforcement interactions: a receiver’s perspective

“…Third, students have been used successfully before in studies in the suspect interview (cf. Beune, Giebels, Adair, Fennis, & Van der Zee, 2011;Russano, Meissner, Narchet, & Kassin, 2005) and crisis negotiation domain (cf. Giebels, Oostinga, Taylor, & Curtis, 2017) with results corresponding to those found in field studies.…”

High‐Stakes Conflicts and the Link between Theory and Practice: Celebrating the Work of Ellen Giebels

“…Negotiators can also specify their strategy beforehand when they know the cultural background of the perpetrator. Ellen's work shows that the cultural background of the perpetrator determines to a great extent whether or not the use of certain tactics is effective (Beune, Giebels, Adair, Fennis, & Van der Zee, ; Giebels, Oostinga, Taylor, & Curtis, ; Giebels & Taylor, ).…”