Discourse Control Strategies in Police-Suspect Interrogation in Nigeria
27 Jan 2015-International Journal of English Linguistics (Canadian Center of Science and Education)-Vol. 5, Iss: 1, pp 146
TL;DR: This paper examined the discourse control strategies in the use of English in police-suspect interrogation in Nigeria with a view to identifying the themes in the interrogation discourse and discussing the pragmatic functions of the dominant discourse control strategy employed by the police interrogators.
Abstract: This study examined the discourse control strategies in the use of English in police-suspect interrogation in Nigeria with a view to identifying the themes in the interrogation discourse and discussing the pragmatic functions of the dominant discourse control strategies employed by the police interrogators. The data gathered were transcribed and analysed, using Thomas' metapragmatic model. The result indicated that assault, affray, house breaking, obtaining by false pretence (419), abduction, and robbery were the common themes in the discourse. Analysis revealed further that the investigating police officers (IPOs) employed illocutionary force indicating devices for intimidation and coercion of suspects while they used discoursal indicators, meta-discoursal comments, and upshots and reformulations as discourse control strategies. The study concluded that police-suspect interrogation is largely slanted in favour of the police interrogators and that police interrogation is a peculiar discourse genre where there is interplay of power asymmetry and dominance.
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01 Jan 2019
TL;DR: Semin et al. as mentioned in this paper investigated the effect of word abstraction on guilt-presumption in interviews and found that using more concrete words can influence who or what becomes the focus of the response.
Abstract: ion has been examined in interviewing settings, it has not been tested where potential interviewers could formulate their own guilt judgements and their own questions. The findings will provide some insight to how word abstraction relates to guilt-presumption under those conditions. Study 3: Chapter 5. This study expands on the findings of Study 2 by extending the investigation into the linguistics of the questions formulated by the interviewer. The design of the study mirrored that of Study 2; however, in this case there are interviewees who will be questioned by the interviewer. It is expected that interviewers who make an initial judgement of guilt will create more accusatory questions containing more negative abstract language. However, previous researchers have suggested that using more concrete words can influence who or what becomes the focus of the response (De Poot & Semin, 1995; Semin, Rubini, & Fiedler, 1995). It is predicted that interviewees will comply with this linguistic pattern, and ultimately focus on themselves, even if the question does not The Influence of Guilt Presumptive Language 33 focus on them. Understanding how language contained within a question can influence the response is pertinent to the investigative interview as an interviewee’s responses can be manipulated by the interviewer’s word choices. Although word choices are not a conscious decision when it comes to word abstraction (Semin, 2011), if an interviewer holds a presumption of guilt, the interviewee’s responses could be perceived as confirmation of that
7 citations
01 Aug 2019
TL;DR: In this article, the authors analyzed six interviews from a single Dutch murder investigation for guilt-presumptive language (accusations and insinuations of guilt) and question appropriateness.
Abstract: Controlled studies have demonstrated that guilt-presumptive questions usually accompany interviewer guilt bias and accusatory behaviours towards a suspect. When evaluating police-suspect interviews, however, conventional methods primarily focus on the appropriateness of questions, and guilt-presumption is not featured as a questioning strategy. Instead, guilt-presumptive utterances are aggregated with other types of inappropriate opinion statements. There is often more happening within an interview than is immediately identifiable by simply focusing on question types. Examining the interactivity and behaviours that lead to accusations can reveal subtleties that have a profound influence on the flow and outcome of the interview. To demonstrate this, we analysed six interviews from a single Dutch murder investigation for guilt-presumptive language (accusations and insinuations of guilt) and question appropriateness. We then analysed the police-suspect interactions within the interview that occurred prior to, and immediately after the guilt-presumptive language was used. The findings demonstrated that accusations prompted suspect denials, facilitated a drastic decline in suspect cooperation, and impeded the ability for interviewers to gain investigation relevant information (IRI). We argue that more applied research on guilt-presumptive language is needed in the investigative interviewing literature, particularly in the context of biased decision-making regarding questioning strategies.
4 citations
TL;DR: In this article , the authors examine how police use tactics to achieve confessions in police-suspect interactions (PSIs) and show that participants in PSIs resort to accentuation of crime, blaming of a third party, minimisation of crimes, deployment of objections, use of alternative questions, avoidance of questions, oblique references, deliberate false statements and resistance to achieve their respective goals.
Abstract: Abstract Existing studies on police interrogation have revealed that investigating police officers (IPOs) often resort to the use of physical force in extracting confessional statements from suspects. However, we maintain that IPOs do not usually subject suspects to torture in a bid to obtain a confession. We therefore examine how IPOs use tactics to achieve confessions in police-suspect interactions (PSIs). Data comprise nine interactions between IPOs and suspects tape-recorded at the Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department, Ìyágankú, Ibadan, Oyo State, Nigeria. Drawing on Bateson’s framing theory, the study reveals that participants in PSIs resort to accentuation of crime, blaming of a third party, minimisation of crime, deployment of objections, use of alternative questions, avoidance of questions, oblique references, deliberate false statements, and resistance to achieve their respective goals. The study demonstrates that PSIs in Nigeria do not always involve the use of physical force by IPOs.
References
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328 citations
"Discourse Control Strategies in Pol..." refers background in this paper
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"Discourse Control Strategies in Pol..." refers background in this paper
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Abstract: Taking a linguistic perspective, this book is a practical explanation of how confessions work. Roger Shuy, author of the 1993 benchmark work, Language Crimes, examines criminal confessions, the interrogations that elicit confessions, and the deceptive language that plays a role in the actual confession. He presents transcripts from numerous interrogations and analyzes how language is used, how constitutional rights are protected (or not), and discusses consistency, truthfulness, suggestibility, written confessions and unvalidated confessions. He also provides specific advice about how to conduct interrogations that will yield credible evidence.
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TL;DR: This study is the first extensive investigation of Miranda warning variations examining 560 Miranda warnings from across the United States and identified representative Miranda components at different levels of reading comprehension as a template for further research.
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120 citations
"Discourse Control Strategies in Pol..." refers background in this paper
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TL;DR: The first edition of Saeed's Semantics appeared in 1997 as mentioned in this paper, and since then, a number of other texts have appeared: de Swart's Introduction to natural language semantics (1998), Kearns' Semantics (2000), and Allan's Natural Language semantics (2001), among others.
Abstract: SEMANTICS (2nd ed.). John I. Saeed. Oxford: Blackwell, 2003. Pp. xx + 413. 32.95 paper.After a long dry spell in which there were few—if any—satisfactory introductory texts in semantics and pragmatics available, the first edition of Saeed's Semantics appeared in 1997. Since then, a number of other texts have appeared: de Swart's Introduction to natural language semantics (1998), Kearns' Semantics (2000), Allan's Natural language semantics (2001), among others. The primary advantage of the original Saeed text as well as this revised and updated version is its comprehensiveness. It includes descriptive lexical semantics, an introduction to formal semantics, the cognitive approaches of Lakoff and others, and more pragmatics than most of its competitors.
113 citations
"Discourse Control Strategies in Pol..." refers background in this paper
...The main thrust of this theory is that “human utterances perform certain acts” as against the hitherto held view that the main function of sentences is to state facts along the line of being true or false (Saeed, 2003, p. 223)....
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...The four sentences above, in Austin’s classification, are performative utterances because they do not each give information or describe the state of affairs but they are in themselves a kind of action, Saeed (2003)....
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