A criminal confession typically ends in conviction, raising a critically important question: Why do suspects decide to confess to their guilt against their own self-interests? The authors of this chapter answer this question by reviewing a large body of theoretical and empirical research related to decision-making involving confessions. Major topics covered include the distinction between different types of confessions, the Reid technique, Miranda waiver decisions, psychological and dispositional vulnerabilities that encourage a confession decision, and interrogation reforms and their impact on confessions and interrogations. The core message of the chapter is that the dominant method of police interrogation used in North America relies on well-established social influence tactics that cause suspects to perceive a confession as a rational decision under the circumstances. The authors examine research involving these tactics and their effects on interrogations and confessions, along with laws and policies that regulate interviews and interrogations of suspects in custody.

Chapter 1 examines the steps that are attendant to custodial interrogation in the United States. Many of these steps, and what they entail, are not readily known to the general public. Hence, to contextualize the corpus, Chapter 1 starts with a brief overview of what constitutes custodial interrogation, leading to a description of the federal court system that reviewed the cases. This examination will provide insights into the inner workings of the federal courts and the role of the judges in the federal court system. Chapter 1 also provides a brief overview of the common grounds for appeals in cases reviewing potential Miranda violations, as well as definitions for the terminology often referred to in the chapters. The chapter concludes with a brief analysis on the three key themes of the book: the legal foundation of police interrogation, the strategic features of invoking counsel in custodial settings, and tackling police interrogation reform in the United States.

Chapter 3 delves into commonly used police interrogation techniques in the United States, such as behavioral analysis approaches to interrogation (the Reid technique) and other rapport-based methods featured in the High Value Detainee Interrogation Group (HIG) Report (2016). This chapter focuses on some of the interrogation methods used by police, law enforcement agencies of the United States federal government (e.g., FBI, DEA), and the military to interrogate custodial suspects and evaluates how these methods fit with the Miranda rights and a suspect’s ability to invoke counsel in a custodial setting. How interrogators approach the Miranda rights stage of an interrogation across the book’s corpus, and potentially across interviewing styles, provides insights into the possible connection between the law and how interviewing styles are used and implemented in the United States. Chapter 3 also raises additional considerations when discussing any interrogation or interviewing style, in light of current United States law.

Chapter 6 will explore paths to moving forward with police interrogation reform in the United States, parting from the lessons of other countries that have undertaken reform, such as the United Kingdom, Australia, Norway, and Canada, while focusing on three key areas: 1) police interrogation techniques, 2) the interview of vulnerable populations, and 3) changes in case law related to the reading of rights, invocation of rights, the use of trickery and deception, as well as the use of confessions to build and prosecute a criminal case. The goal of the chapter is to consider ways in which the issues presented in this book can be revisited to change the current state of police interrogation in the United States. This will require changes across the board: legislative, legal, police interviewing training, and also an acknowledgment of the role of cognitive, cultural, and sociolinguistic factors in police-suspect discursive interactions. A change of perspective on the presence of counsel in the interview room is also explored, looking at other jurisdictions outside of the United States which provide access to counsel to custodial suspects.

Doctors and prosecutors who defend the diagnosis of shaken baby syndrome (SBS) point, among other things, to the many confessions obtained from parents and other caregivers as evidence of the reality of the diagnosis. Drawing on the existing social science research, this chapter examines the questions of (1) how, if at all, interrogations of those suspected of injuring or killing a child are conducted differently than other interrogations, and (2) what, if anything, would render such suspects more or less vulnerable to confession (true or false). The chapter examines how interrogations are typically conducted, and the primary reasons suspects confess, keeping in mind that their confessions can be either true or false. In the end, this chapter concludes that suspects in alleged shaken baby cases are arguably more vulnerable to false confession than those suspected of other crimes, and accordingly one cannot assume the reliability or truthfulness of confessions in these cases.