Towards understanding the effects of interviewer training in evaluating the cognitive interview

The effectiveness of the cognitive interview (CI) technique has been demonstrated in experimental studies of eyewitness memory conducted in the USA, Germany, and the UK. Much of the research, however, has used college students as interviewers rather than professionals who regularly interview witnesses (e.g. police officers). The aim of this research was to examine the effects of such CI training using experienced police officers with established interviewing styles. An armed robbery was staged and information was elicited in witness interviews. The CI did not significantly increase correct recall but tended to produce more suppositions and errors. A qualitative analysis of interviewer behaviour showed that many officers had difficulty in applying the new cognitive techniques and in avoiding the use of closed and leading questions. The paper addresses two issues: first, that of training experienced police officers who have received relatively little prior training in investigative interviewing, and second, the extent to which we can generalize from the laboratory data elicited in previous studies of CI.     

Sports Counseling: A New Counseling Specialty Area

This article provides background information about sports counseling for student-athletes. A proposal for a Council for Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs specialty training area for sports counseling is presented.     

Whither (European) evaluation methodology?

Quasi-experimental evaluation methods promised to provide a way of testing and improving solutions to social problems. These methods have been found wanting. Alternative approaches, including “pragmatic evaluation,” “naturalistic evaluation,” and “pluralist evaluation” are also shown to be unsatisfactory. The initial promise of the evaluation movement has been disappointed. Realistic evaluation is advocated as an alternative to existing forms of evaluation. It is rooted in some European traditions in epistemology, ontology, and social theory. It offers a framework within which rigorous outcome evaluations can be undertaken with results that can inform policy and practice. He is president of the Research Committee on Methodology of the International Sociological Association. He is seconded part-time to the Home Office Police Research Group as a research consultant. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the founding conference of the European Evaluation Society, The Hague, 1–2 December, 1994.     

Empirical Support for the Critical Assumptions of Empowerment Theory

This exploratory case study provides empirical support for three critical assumptions of empowerment theory. Many empowerment theorists have argued that empowerment takes on multiple forms across people, is contextually embedded, and shifts over time (Rappaport, 1984; Zimmerman, 1990, 1995). To better understand the implications of these assumptions for empowerment theory and the research and intervention methods we employ, the empowerment experiences of 49 employees within a large human service delivery organization were explored. A method well suited to investigate empowerment's assumptions of multiplicity and dynamism—a constructivist approach to inquiry—was employed. Content analyses of interview and observational data revealed that the process of empowerment may be more complex than originally conceived. Not only did multiple meanings and desires for empowerment emerge across employees and between employees and leaders, but several shifting ecologies impacted the employees' lives, causing the employees' empowerment experiences to fluctuate. Empowerment emerged as a dynamic, highly individualistic, contextually layered process. Multiple forms, contexts, and dynamics that influenced employee empowerment are described. Implications of these findings for empowerment research and intervention are discussed.     

Death scene characteristics in 118 fatal cases of autoerotic asphyxia compared with suicidal asphyxia

A series of 118 autoerotic asphyxial deaths, recorded by the Coroners or Medical Examiners from the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Alberta, were compared with the same number of asphyxial suicides matched by province, year of death (within 3 years) and method of asphyxiation. Comparison of the death scenes revealed major differences between the two groups, with nudity of the body, evidence of a wide range of sexual activity at the time of death, and absence of verbal or written indication of suicidal intent being characteristic of the autoerotic asphyxia group. The data indicate that autoerotic asphyxia and suicidal asphyxia can usually be readily distinguished by death scene features.     

Physical appearance and criminality

Throughout the history of psychology the controversial belief in a relationship between physical appearance and criminality has reared its ugly head! Though modern criminologists do not believe that criminals belong to a single physical type, it is possible that the general public, the police, juries, and so forth, may believe in such relationships and act accordingly. The present paper describes some investigations of the extent to which the general public and the police believe that ‘the face fits the crime’. Studies of the facial appearance of prison inmates are reviewed, as is research on the effects of plastic surgery on prison recidivism rates. The relationship between children’s physical appearance and behavioural abnormalities is discussed, as is the literature on the way that we react to children as a function of their facial appearance. Studies concerning society’s reactions to facial disfigurement are presented to show that there may be some support for Cavior, Hayes and Cavior’s (1975) view that ‘low physical attractiveness contributes to careers of deviancy’.     

The independent roles of diet and serum lipids in the 20th-century rise and decline of coronary heart disease mortality

Risk factors are causally related to coronary heart disease (CHD), but in widely varying historic, geographic, socioeconomic, and individual relationships. Serum cholesterol is only one of many risk factors that, even when considered together in prospective studies, account for well under half of the CHD incidence. It is neither primarily regulated by the diet nor significantly related to it. Many findings discordant with widespread beliefs about a causal role of the diet in CHD are reviewed. It may be concluded that dietary fats are largely not responsible for relationships of serum cholesterol to CHD, or for its 20th-century rise and decline.     

Expectations for Traditional Family Roles: Palestinian Adolescents in the West Bank and Gaza

This study explored the family role expectationsof 14- and 15-year-old Palestinian young men and womenliving in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. It wasanticipated that modernization, along with the youth's involvement in the intifada, thepopular uprising against Israeli occupation, hadfostered more liberal family role expectations among theyouth. The data were collected via questionnaire in1994-1995 from all of the ninth grade students attendingUnited Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) schoolsin the West Bank. The students completed the Arabicquestionnaire at school and took home questionnaires for their mothers and their fathers. In Gaza,samples of the ninth grade students attending UNRWAschools and of those attending schools operated by thePalestinian Ministry of Education were selected. The students' response rates were over 90%,while mothers' and fathers' exceeded 80%. Overall, datawere collected from 7,000 Palestinian families. Theresults revealed that, contrary to our expectation, Palestinian youth desire and anticipate havingtraditional families very similar to those of theirparents. Interestingly, intifada participation was notassociated with a decrease in support for traditional family roles. There were significantdifferences between the boys' and girls' perceptions offuture gender roles in Palestinian society. The youngwomen expressed more liberal attitudes towards women's roles and participation in society, while atthe same time supporting traditional familyroles.