Loading the library…
Showing 3 verified claims · child witnesses & forensic interviewing
Delayed disclosure is the norm in child sexual abuse: most victims do not tell during childhood or delay for months to years, with predictable barriers (young age, intrafamilial abuse, lack of caregiver support), so delay by itself is not evidence of fabrication; how often disclosed cases involve subsequent denial or recantation is genuinely contested, with recantation estimates ranging from uncommon to roughly 23% in dependency samples — where recantation tracks family pressure rather than false allegation.
Young children's reports can be substantially distorted by suggestive, leading, or coercive interviewing, creating a real risk of false accounts; at the same time, children are not inherently unreliable — with developmentally appropriate, non-leading, supportive protocols they can give accurate accounts — so reliability turns on interview quality and conditions, not age alone.