by Elizabeth Ann Dickerhoof

A 5-year old child can be tall, attractive and well groomed. The legal profession believes that this is a nice, honest young child who will tell the truth. This is true; however, what the legal profession doesn't know is that the young child's intellectual development, or mind does not think the way the adult does. Young children, ages 3 - 7 years are usually prelogical in their thinking process. This means that they have poor memories, are suggestible, are perceptually oriented rather than being logical thinkers, egocentric, unreliable and prone to fantasy.

Most young children's memory, ages 2 - 5 years, are not reliable after 72 hours. Several experiments conducted in preschools by experienced preschool teachers will prove the point. One preschool teacher baked brownies for her young 3-year old class. The children were delighted with the snack which she served on Friday morning. On Monday morning when the young three's returned to school, each child was asked individually what special snack did they have on Friday. None of the children remembered. A few of the children answered crackers and juice which was their usual snack. This activity was repeated at another preschool with 21/2-year old children. They were served ice cream floats for a snack. On Monday morning, no child remembered what they had for a snack.

One 4-year old preschool teacher had her class toast pumpkin seeds. The children were very involved in the activity, discussing how "icky" the pumpkin seeds felt in their hands. The next morning the preschool teacher asked each child individually what special activity they did the morning before. Five out of the nine, 41/2-year olds remembered toasting the pumpkin seeds. The following morning, forty-eight hours after the activity, only one preschooler remembered the event.

One lawyer asked a tall, attractive, verbal, 41/2-year old girl witness what she did when she visited her therapist's office (17 visits) and the child's reply was "I don't know". After 17 visits, the average adult would think that the child should have remembered something, but she didn't, an excellent example of the prelogical young child's poor memory. It should come as no surprise to the astute reader of this article that the young girl did not remember being sexually abused either!

The prelogical or pre-operational stage of cognitive development is only one of four stages (each with its own characteristics and tests to determine the child's stage of intellectual development) of cognitive development. According to Jean Piaget, a Swiss psychologist, who began the systematic study of children's thinking in the 1920's, children go through four stages of intellectual development. All children, beginning from infancy, pass through an orderly succession of developmental stages. The child's stage of development determines his memory, suggestibility, reliability of thought process and more!

The first stage of cognitive development is the sensor-motor stage, ages birth to 18 months, the second is the pre-operational or prelogical stage, ages 2 - 7 years. The concrete or logical operational stage of development is 7 - 13 years and the formal operational stage of cognitive development is 13 years+. Each stage of development has definite characteristics and there are tests to determine a child's stage of intellectual development.

Child witnesses in the Judicial System should be tested to determine their stage of intellectual development. Knowing the child's stage of development and the characteristics associated with each stage will help the lawyer, judge and jury determine the reliability of the child's testimony. Chronological, age alone does not determine the child's stage of intellectual development. Two 6-year old child witnesses can have different thinking processes. One child may be thinking logically and the second illogically. Even twins have tested differently, on Piagetian's tests, one twin thinking logically and the second thinking illogically.

Some 5-year old children are logical thinkers with excellent memories. They are excellent, consistent, reliable witnesses for the Judicial system. Other 9-year old children are illogical thinkers with poor memories. Even though the 9-year old child looks mature, his thinking process may be unreliable and illogical.

Each child witness in the Judicial System should be tested on Piagetian tests to determine their logical or illogical thinking process. The basic Piagetian test consists of four "activities" which take about twenty minutes to administer and are very child oriented including play-dough and checkers. The test should be video taped so that it is available to the Court. The knowledge gained from this test concerning the child witnesses thinking process is important for the legal system to have in order to make an accurate determination as to the reliability or unreliability of the child witnesses testimony.

About Elizabeth Ann Dickerhoof