Abstract
Despite the popular perception that criminal investigations are often solved through the collection of objective or scientific evidence, most cases submitted for prosecution rely on confessions by suspects. Surprisingly, very little is known about which techniques are effective at eliciting admissions from guilty suspects, and in turn, which might be considered to be coercive. In the current study, 200 mock jurors (in Australia) were asked to rate the acceptability of 13 common police interviewing techniques (such as pointing out contradictions, minimisation, silence, etc.). Subjects read one of four versions of a transcript of an interrogation with a suspected sex offender. The transcripts only differed in one detail, the final outcome of the interrogation, with each subject reading one of four different endings (suspect confessed, made a partial admission, denied, or used their right to silence). The results showed that the majority of the strategies were perceived to be coercive, but acceptable. Further, the βends do not justify the meansβ, in that perceptions of coercion were consistent regardless of the outcome of the interview. The findings are discussed in relation to existing laws and procedures governing police interrogation of suspects, including the ambiguities over the definitions of coercion, oppression, and torture. Copyright Β© 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.