The Frequency of False Allegations of Child Sexual Abuse: A Critical Review

O’Donohue, William; Cummings, Caroline; Willis, Brendan

doi:10.1080/10538712.2018.1477224

Cited by 41 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 21 publications

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“…In legal cases, witnesses, victims, and suspects sometimes lie by falsely denying to have experienced an event or to have been involved in an experience (e.g. Block et al, 2012;Goodman-Brown et al, 2003;O'Donohue et al, 2018). Moreover, liars can decide to lie about certain aspects of the event and tell the truth about other aspects of the event.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

What can we remember after complex denials? The impact of different false denials on memory

Battista

Curci

Mangiulli

et al. 2021

Psychology, Crime & Law

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False denial is a deceptive strategy that requires fewer cognitive resources than other strategies (e.g. simulating amnesia, fabrication). In the present experiment, we examined the effects of different types of false denials varying in cognitive load on memory. Participants (N = 159) watched a video (theft) and then answered some questions about it. Some participants had to tell the truth about the theft, while others were either asked to falsely deny all the event-related details (i.e. simple false denial) or to falsely deny just some details of the same event (i.e. complex false denial). After two days, all participants completed a memory task in which they truthfully recognized whether details were (i) discussed during the interview or (ii) seen in the video. Additionally, recall scores (i.e. correct details, omissions, commissions) of the memory for the event were assessed. Participants who falsely denied all details reported a higher memory impairment for the interview than the other groups. Interestingly, liars who were engaged in complex denying had the largest memory impairment for the event and reported more commissions than those in the simple false denial group. This experiment shows that under certain conditions, memory is increasingly impaired for high cognitive load lies.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

What can we remember after complex denials? The impact of different false denials on memory

Battista

Curci

Mangiulli

et al. 2021

Psychology, Crime & Law

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…But we are unable to make formal links between this observation and expectations of incidence in a particular setting such as the Family Court. Overviews such as that of O’Donohue et al (2018) would suggest that allegations of child sexual abuse in this setting are more likely to be true than otherwise. But we are also aware that powerful competing narratives persist regarding the juxtaposition of parental separation and such allegations.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…O’Donohue, Cummings and Wills (2018) provide a recent, detailed review of the literature on the apparent frequency of false allegations of child sexual abuse. After careful consideration of sampling and methodological issues attached to multiple studies, they conclude that a large majority of allegations of child sexual abuse are likely to be true.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Allegations of child sexual abuse: An empirical analysis of published judgements from the Family Court of Australia 2012–2019

Webb

Moloney

Smyth

et al. 2021

Aust J Social Issues

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Allegations of child sexual abuse pose agonisingly difficult issues for families, family law professionals and the courts. We present data from the population (N=521) of Family Court of Australia judgements containing allegations of child sexual abuse published in the Australasian Legal Information Institute's Australian database. Our data cover all in-scope judgements published between mid-2012 and mid-2019, of which 71 dealt with cases that were uncontested. A further 70 were contested but the allegations were abandoned before the end of the trial. We classified the remaining 380 cases as "fully contested". Of this group: (a) in 14% of cases, judicial officers expressed a direct or clearly implied belief that the allegations of child sexual abuse were true; (b) risk of sexual harm to a child was found in 12% of judgements; (c) when no risk of sexual harm was found, judges were more than twice as likely to regard the allegations as genuine but mistaken rather than to have been deliberately misleading; (d) just under two-thirds of allegedly unsafe | 323 WEBB Et al.

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“…Despite this ambiguity, experts agree that false allegations are not common or prevalent and that the more substantial problem is unreported cases of sexual violence (Fisher et al, 2000;Koss, 1988;National Victim Center, 1992;Saunders, 2012). Similarly, with regards to false allegations of CSA, barring specific circumstances such as child custody hearings, most allegations of CSA are founded (O'Donohue et al, 2018).…”

Section: False Allegationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Self-affirmation and False Allegations: The Effects on Responses to Disclosures of Sexual Victimization

Roos

Jones

2020

J Interpers Violence

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The rise of the #MeToo movement highlights the prevalence of sexual victimization and gives a voice to victims who may have been silent before. Nevertheless, survivors or victims of sexual violence who come forward may be blamed or not believed. These reactions are evident both with adult and child victims. Further, fears about false accusations of sexual misconduct may negatively impact responses to disclosures. This study aimed to examine gender differences in perceptions toward the #MeToo movement, and the extent to which these translate into a skeptical response to disclosure. Further, we wanted to explore whether proximity to false allegations of sexual violence was linked with more negative responses and whether use of self-affirmations may decrease the likelihood of such a response. Through an online survey ( N = 235) on Amazon’s Mechanical Turk, we assessed participants’ exposure to and perceptions of the #MeToo movement. Further, we asked them about their proximity to sexual violence (victimization or perpetration) and to false allegations. Using a threat manipulation (news article about false accusation) and a self-affirmation exercise, we studied the effects of both variables on responses to disclosure. Results indicated that after reading an article about a false accusation, male participants were more likely to blame a victim of childhood sexual abuse and to perceive the abuse as less harmful, compared with female participants. Further, we found that self-affirmation was linked with more supportive responses to a disclosure. These findings highlight the threatening nature of false accusations of sexual violence for men, and how this threat may shape the narrative regarding sexual violence. Opportunities to use self-affirmation to change this narrative to a more supportive one are discussed.

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The Frequency of False Allegations of Child Sexual Abuse: A Critical Review

Cited by 41 publications

References 21 publications

What can we remember after complex denials? The impact of different false denials on memory

What can we remember after complex denials? The impact of different false denials on memory

Allegations of child sexual abuse: An empirical analysis of published judgements from the Family Court of Australia 2012–2019

Self-affirmation and False Allegations: The Effects on Responses to Disclosures of Sexual Victimization

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