According to the Home Office Memorandum (1992), a rapport-building phase should always be included at the start of an interview with a child undertaken for criminal proceedings. Research on rapport-building in investigative interviews with children has tended to focus on interviewer techniques in motivating children to give more detailed narratives in the substantive phase of the interview. Little is understood about the way rapport is built or the importance of the relationship between the police officer and the child. Research on the relationship in psychotherapy, however, has found that it is an important predictor of outcome, and that therapists' in-session behaviours differ in high and low alliance therapies. This study was undertaken to investigate how police officers build rapport in evidential interviews with children, and to explore difference in interviewer verbal behaviour between police officers and clinical child psychologists in initial therapeutic interviews. A brief survey of police officers' and clinical child psychologists' perceptions of the initial phase of an interview with a child was conducted. Verbal behaviours of police officers in the rapport-building phase of investigative interviews with children were explored using Stiles' (1992) verbal response modes (VRM) coding system. These behaviours were then compared with those of clinical child psychologists in initial therapeutic interviews with children. Comparisons were also made between police officers talking to children and published profiles of conversations investigated using Stiles (1992) taxonomy. The results of the survey revealed that police officers (N = 18) and clinical psychologists (N = 22) had similar perceptions of the initial phase of interviews with children. Whilst some differences were found in VRM profiles, with respect to Edification, Advisement, Acknowledgement and Reflection Intents, the speech acts of police officers (N = 44) and clinical psychologists (N = 8) were generally similar. Further analysis of police officers' verbal behaviour revealed significant main and interaction effects of child and interviewer characteristics. Comparisons were made between police officers'VRMs and speakers in other conversational settings. These revealed that police officers spoke to children in rapport-building most like parents talking to children, the clinical child psychologists in this study, and radio programine hosts talking to callers with psychological issues, and least like attorneys questioning witnesses. This study has raised a number of issues for further investigation. Future research should emphasise the importance of investigating the interpersonal processes of rapport-building in evidential interviews with children, and explore differences in the quality of rapport built and the effects of such differences.

No / In a memory survey, adult respondents recalled, dated, and described two earliest positive and negative memories that they were highly confident were memories. They then answered a series of questions that focused on memory details such as clothing, duration, weather, and so on. Few differences were found between positive and negative memories, which on average had 4/5 details and dated to the age of 6/6.5 years. Memory for details about activity, location, and who was present was good; memory for all other details was poorer or at floor. Taken together, these findings indicate that (full) earliest memories may be considerably later than previously thought and that they rarely contain the sort of specific details targeted by professional investigators. The resulting normative profile of memory details reported here can be used to evaluate overly specific childhood autobiographical memories and to identify memory details with a low probability of recall.

Thesis (MA (African Languages))--University of Stellenbosch, 2007. / The purpose of this study is to apply existing theories with regard to second language acquisition in a South African context, in order to address specific needs of Sepedi second language learners in the South African Police Service, with specific focus on the Community Service Centre and within the guidelines of the Batho Pele principles. The study presents an overview on Universal Grammar and the roles it played within second language acquisition as well as the principles and parameters it presented for language development. It further analysed the acquisition processes of languages and the roles the learner plays as individual and part of a social interacting group. Form-meaning connections utilised by learners is defined as a fundamental aspect for both first and second language acquisitions are discussed broadly in the study, inclusive of the psycholinguistic consequences as well as other input factors that may influence form-meaning connections. The specific role of language instruction is also reviewed in this study. Specific focus is placed on the roles of implicit and explicit instruction and the effectiveness thereof in second language acquisitioning and noticing. Task-based theories were also evaluated, with the accent on the definition of tasks, task characteristics, task grading and other factors relating to tasks such as procedural factors. The role of tasks was further explored in second language acquisition, inclusive of the variables that need to be addressed. The definition of tasks into focussed and unfocused tasks are also scrutinized against the learner interaction in the acquisition process. The implementation of tasks and the impact thereof on comprehension and language acquisition is also reviewed. Different models of methods to design a focussed task are discussed. The successful acquisition of a second language will also be based on the correct collation of data and the sequencing thereof in such manners to allow learners the opportunity to comprehend it as sufficiently as possible. The study further focuses on the methodology of task-based teaching and the use of communicative tasks in second language acquisition. Finally the interviews between the community and the police officials are then analysed in respect of complexity models, against the cognitive and syntactic complexity for specific purposes as well against the genre-approach to second language teaching. The characterizing of such interviews will allow the defining and grading of tasks to ensure sound development of teaching models for second language learning.