Children's eyewitness memory for a repeated event

Objective: This study examined a significant issue for chronic sexual abuse investigations: Children's eyewitness testimony about repeated events. The few previous studies focused on preschoolers and none used the present met hodology of presenting repeated events differing slightly in their details, as would happen in chronic abuse. Method: One group of 6- to 7-year-olds played individually with an experime nter on one occasion; the other group experienced three such events, with s ome details remaining the same and others changing. In a phased interview, children were questioned about the initial event. Results: For details which stayed the same, the children who experienced th ree events had more accurate memories. They had poorer memories than the si ngle-event group for details which were changed in the later events; howeve r, this was due to interference errors, with errors of omission and commiss ion bring lower than in the single-event group. Children conveyed clearly t hat inappropriate touching did not occur. Conclusions: Children who experience repeated events have increased recall for repeated details but confuse the timing of details which change across events. The findings support previous suggestions that (a) it is unrealisti c to expect children to be able to report repeated events without some conf usion about timimg of derails and (b) children are resistant to misleading questions about abuse. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd.