Eliciting information and detecting lies in intelligence interviewing: an overview of recent research

Traditional police–suspect interviews differ from intelligence interviews in several important ways, and these differences merit new research activities. This article presents an overview of recent and innovative research into eliciting infor- mation and cues to deceit in intelligence interviews, and discusses research into new domains including ‘lying about intentions’, ‘undercover interviewing’, and ‘collective interviewing’. Although that research is still in its infancy, the findings reveal that truth tellers’ and liars’ answers can be distinguished from each other if the correct interview protocols are implemented, such as asking unexpected questions and introducing forced turn-taking. In addition, this new research also shows that the so-called Scharff tech- nique is more effective for eliciting human intelligence information compared with more traditional techniques.