Interviewing of Children for Family Law Matters: A Review

Abstract

Objective

This study aims to provide a review of the current literature on the interviewing of children for family law matters as an up‐to‐date resource for practitioners who might be starting out in, or considering entering, the family law arena and as a guide for future research.

Method

This study is a literature review of publications concerning the purpose and practice of child interviews in family law matters. Specifically, this review is structured around the following questions: (a) what is sought from interviews with children for family law matters; (b) what capacity do children have to provide reliable information; and (c) how should children and how are children currently being interviewed in the family law context.

Results

Research on the interviewing of children for family law matters is still in its infancy, with the majority of the work concentrated on providing guidelines, principles, and suggestions for interviews without an evaluation of whether these guidelines or suggestions are being utilised or whether they are effective.

Conclusions

No one has yet extensively examined how child interviews for parenting disputes are being conducted. Overall, the aim of future research should therefore include investigation of: (a) how children are actually being interviewed for reports in family law proceedings; (b) what effect known interviewing techniques have in the family law context; and (c) how best practice interviewing can be developed and applied for assessments in family law proceedings.

Key words:

• best interests
• child interviews
• children's participation
• family assessments
• family law
• investigative interviewing

Notes

1. In Australia, reports for proceedings on children's issues are generally known as either family or expert witness reports. In the United States, these same reports are typically known as child custody evaluations. Although there are potential differences between these reports, the issues in relation to interviewing children remain the same. Therefore the terms “child custody evaluations,” “family reports,” “family assessments,” and “expert witness reports” are used interchangeably in this article to mean any report or assessment conducted for the court and/or parties in relation to a parenting dispute.

2. An investigative interview is any interview conducted for a forensic purpose which has the objective of eliciting the most accurate, complete, and detailed account from the interviewee (Milne & Powell, 2010).