Effectiveness and efficacy of a culturally adapted training program for child interviewers in Chile.

Abstract

Advances in investigative interviewer training, mostly developed in Western-Anglo-Saxon contexts, are not necessarily applicable to other cultures and languages. This research examined the efficacy and effectiveness of a training program for child interviewers-previously tested with English-speaking cohorts-when adapted to a Latin American Spanish-speaking context. Twenty-eight Chilean interviewers completed an online training program. Study 1 assessed their performance in mock interviews before training, immediately after training, and 13-21 months later at follow-up (N = 84). Study 2 examined field interviews about alleged child sexual abuse (N = 166). The performance of interviewers from Study 1 after training and at follow-up was compared to a group of 14 untrained interviewers. Dependent measures included a set of indicators of best practice interviewing (e.g., open-ended question use). Linear mixed effects analyses demonstrated robust training effects. Training improved most measures of best practice interviewing in mock and field interviews (including open-ended question use). Improvements were sustained up to 21 months in mock interviews and some up to 22 months in field interviews. Culturally specific attributes were evident in the interviewers' performance in the field. This work demonstrates that evidence-based interviewer training can be culturally adapted and yield positive training outcomes. Findings also suggest that culture-related factors do not interfere with learning best practice interviewing, but along with other unknown contextual factors, they might moderate the use of learned skills in real-world settings. Implications for policy and recommendations for researchers and practitioners aiming to adapt evidence-based training programs to new contexts are drawn from the findings.