면담자의 정서적 태도 및 아동의 개인차 특성이 아동의 자발적 회상과 암시적 정보의 저항 수준에 미치는 영향

The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of the attitude of the interviewer and children’s individual characteristics on the accuracy of the memory of children. In this study, 90 children aged of 4-11 years old living in the metropolitan area were interviewed to investigate the accuracy of the child retrospective report. Specifically, the attitude of the interviewer was presented as supportive, neutral, and non-supportive, and the accuracy of the child's voluntary response to the open-ended question of the interviewer and the degree of resistance to the suggestive question were examined. We also examined the effect of the interviewer‘s attitude on the child's individual characteristics. The results were as follows. First, the children’s spontaneous recall was higher and the resistance to the suggestive question was better when the attitude of the interviewer was supportive rather than neutral or non-supportive. Additionally, the supportive attitude of the interviewer affected the accuracy of the children’s memory differently according to the degree of the child pro-social nature, which was measured using a child strength and difficulty questionnaire completed by parents. Children with a lower pro-social orientation were more likely to be affected by the supportive attitude of the interviewer. Based on these results, we discussed the importance of the interviewer's attitude in the reliability of the statements in the context of the child investigative interview.