Voogt Ashmyra, Klettke Bianca, Thomson Donald
School of Psychology, Deakin University, Burwood, Victoria, Australia.
Psychiatr Psychol Law. 2017 May 3;24(5):760-769. doi: 10.1080/13218719.2017.1315764. eCollection 2017.
Perceived victim credibility is a crucial factor in jury decision-making, especially in the context of child sexual assault cases where there are often no corroborating witnesses. Yet despite the importance of credibility and the expanding research in this area, there remains no unified understanding of what credibility is, what domains it encompasses and how it can be comprehensively measured. This article proposes a conceptual model of perceived victim credibility encompassing the five domains of accuracy, believability, competency, reliability and truthfulness. These domains are defined, distinguishing between the various sub-constructs based on the items they encompass. This model provides a theoretical framework for the development of an instrument to measure perceived victim credibility in future research studies. This is valuable for both researchers and professionals working in the area of child sexual assault in terms of understanding the construct of credibility and unifying the approach to measuring and comparing attitudes.
受害者可信度认知是陪审团决策中的一个关键因素，尤其是在儿童性侵犯案件中，这类案件往往没有佐证证人。然而，尽管可信度很重要，且该领域的研究不断扩展，但对于可信度是什么、它涵盖哪些领域以及如何进行全面衡量，仍未达成统一的认识。本文提出了一个受害者可信度认知的概念模型，该模型涵盖准确性、可信度、能力、可靠性和真实性这五个领域。对这些领域进行了定义，并根据它们所包含的项目区分了各种子结构。该模型为未来研究中开发一种衡量受害者可信度认知的工具提供了理论框架。这对于从事儿童性侵犯领域研究的人员和专业人士理解可信度的构成以及统一衡量和比较态度方法而言都具有重要价值。
