‘I’ll help you boys as much as I can': How eagerness to please can result in a false confession
- 1 September 1995
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Taylor & Francis in Journal of Forensic Psychiatry
- Vol. 6 (2) , 333-342
- https://doi.org/10.1080/09585189508409899
Abstract
This article describes the case of a 25-year-old man (Mr J) who confessed during police interviewing to having set a series of fires whilst he worked as a voluntary fireman. His confession to the police had the hallmarks of a 'coerced-internalized' false confession. The case illustrates the process whereby such confessions can, in certain circumstances, occur quite easily with psychologically vulnerable individuals. Mr J's salient vulnerabilities were: his eagerness to please the investigating officers; firm trust in the police and great respect for them; lack of confidence in his memory of events; and high suggestibility. The author argues that special problems may arise in cases where the individual's role changes from that of a witness in an informal interview to that of a suspect.Keywords
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