Confabulators never intend to deceive; they are sincere and actually believe what they are saying. Nonetheless, the information they provide is “worthless” since it is not true and is the product of “malfunctioning brain processes” (Hirstein, 2009). As a forensic psychology professional, you may encounter different types of confabulations. There are spontaneous confabulations, which are statements that are freely volunteered. Then, there are provoked confabulations, which are statements produced as a result of questioning. And a third type of confabulations, which you can help prevent, are called forced confabulations. Forced confabulations may occur in forensic interviews “when an interviewer presses an eyewitness to answer a question even though the eyewitness has indicated that he or she does not know or is unsure of the answer to the question” (Stolzenberg and Pezdek, 2013).
Review the Learning Resources for this Discussion.
Recall what you learned in Week 8 about suggestibility.
Select one of the following topics related to confabulation in forensic psychological and legal (i.e., psycholegal) settings on which to focus for this Discussion:
Compliance
Suggestibility
Forced Confabulation
Fantasy-proneness
Dissociation
Cognitive failures
False Confessions
False Memory Creation
Memory Hardening
Identify the article you selected and explain its key findings.
Describe several ways that interviewers can help prevent the topic you selected from happening during the interviewing process.
Explain why you think it is important for interviewers to understand both suggestibility and confabulation.
Note: Your posts should be substantial (350 words minimum), supported with scholarly evidence from your research and/or the Learning Resources, and properly cited using APA Style. Personal anecdotes are acceptable as part of a meaningful post but cannot stand alone as entire post.