The child as a witness

Abstract

The increasing participation of children in judicial proceedings raises two central issues: the competency of the child as a witness and the effects on the child of testifying about a traumatic experience. After discussing these issues, the authors present the recommendations of forensic child psychiatrists on how to improve the judicial process to elicit more accurate testimony from child witnesses--for example, by videotaping a child's testimony to avoid repeated interrogations, using anatomically correct dolls and pictures to allow the child to recount events through displacement, and using one skilled interviewer throughout the proceeding to allow rapport to develop between interviewer and child. They then discuss the role of the child psychiatrist in court proceedings involving child witnesses.