Fanetti Matthew - Forensic child psychology: working in the courts and clinic

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The field of forensic psychology has grown slowly over the past century. From the early debates by Hugo Munsterberg and Sigmund Freud that psychology should play a larger role in the legal system, to the use of psychology in advocating the elimination of segregation in schools in the U.S. Supreme Court case Brown v. Board of Education, psychology has struggled to help legal decision makers be better informed. The past five decades have seen an exponential growth in the use of scientific research to answer important questions in forensics, from matters such as bystander inaction to the strengths and frailties of the memories of eyewitnesses. In the 1990s, psychology responded to a rash of well-publicized day-care child sexual abuse scandals, with a push for scientific understanding of children's allegations of sexual abuse. In just 25 years, the applied field of child sexual abuse assessment has come from an ad hoc and unstandardized approach to assessment, characterized by wild disagreements and untrained assessors, to a (mostly) highly controlled approach, which is informed by research with an aim to understand and reduce error. In our estimation, this is a very desirable outcome of mere decades. Psychology can work with the applied community and it can help to work toward better responses to real problems. Ultimately, this was the position of Munsterberg and Freud, though the field at the time was not ready to provide the necessary support.

College instructors today have an interesting problem: finding a text that supports the goals of their classes in forensic psychology. Unlike courses such as the typical general Introduction to Psychology experience (for which available texts are plentiful and varied), undergraduate texts in forensic psychology are rare. Even worse, those with a focus on child issues are even more rare. Compound this with the fact that most available texts are written for students with strong backgrounds in psychology (or graduate students and professors in psychology) and what does an instructor do for a forensic psychology course filled with sophomores in social work, criminology, nursing, premed, and so on? These students need to understand some basic principles, because these principles affect an everyday working environment. However, many students do not have sufficient background in psychology to use an advanced forensic psychology text. Furthermore, they have little need of many of the specific topics discussed in those texts.

The overarching goal of this text is to provide an accessible and basic examination of psychology and law pertaining to children so that students who will enter into the workforce with need of this kind of information will be better prepared. We have focused on writing style and ease of use. Rather than a text that explores every permutation of every relevant concept, we focus on a clear and well-explained iteration of basic ideas. The goal is clarity and understanding, not comprehensive depth.

The first focus of the text is a basic review of some concepts in psychology that may be important to those who actually work in forensic environments, including (1) why psychology is a science and why that is important, (2) relevant social and learning psychology, (3) relevant psychopathology, and (4) basic concepts in memory as applied to forensics.

The second focus of the text is an examination of specific topics and concepts related to child forensics, including (1) an overview of child abuse and exploitation, (2) child abuse in the modern technological world, (3) pedophilia and child molestation, (4) assessment of child sexual abuse, and (5) treatment of children who have been abused.

The third and final focus of this text is to provide a basic understanding of the legal world related to child forensics, including (1) basic concepts in law, (2) mandated reporting, (3) juvenile justice systems, and (4) the role of psychological expert witnesses in child abuse cases.

Ultimately, we hope that the text provides a sound framework for building new courses that are specifically designed for those who will be working directly with children. We are hoping to have built an accessible entry point into the field for some and an understandable set of working principles for others.