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Incentives increase the rate of false but not true secondary confessions from informants with an allegiance to a suspect
Law and Human Behavior (2010)
  • Jessica K Swanner, Iowa State University
  • Denise Beike
Abstract

One hundred ninety-two students participated in an experimental simulation testing whether incentives would reduce the reluctance of informants to implicate a close other. Half of the students were made to feel interpersonally close to a confederate who either admitted to or denied a misdeed. All students were interrogated and encouraged to sign a secondary confession stating that the confederate had confessed to the misdeed; half were offered an incentive to do so. Contrary to expectations, closeness did not induce reluctance. Instead, the offer of incentive increased the number of participants willing to sign a secondary confession implicating a close other. Further analyses revealed that this increase occurred only for false secondary confessions. Implications for interrogation practices are discussed.

Keywords
  • secondary confession,
  • interrogation,
  • confession,
  • informant,
  • snitch
Publication Date
2010
Citation Information
Jessica K Swanner and Denise Beike. "Incentives increase the rate of false but not true secondary confessions from informants with an allegiance to a suspect" Law and Human Behavior Vol. 34 Iss. 5 (2010)
Available at: http://works.bepress.com/jessica_swanner/1/