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Sympathy

Techniques > Interrogation > Sympathy

Description | Example | Discussion | See also

Description

Show sympathy for the other person and their situation.

Legitimize what they may have done or said by showing how you understand them.

Offer them mitigating arguments that they can use to excuse themselves.

Example

Carol, I can really understand why you would do that. I've been in similar situations myself and felt like doing it myself.

Look, you were only doing your job, I know. It's not glamorous but somebody's got to do it, haven't they?

Discussion

Interrogators will often play the concerned friend in order to get the other person to confess. It is fairly well known that soft and sympathetic approaches are often more effective at getting confessions and other information.

Sympathy may also be alternated with extreme pressure, perhaps with different people taking different roles.

If the person being interrogated has been trained in counter-interrogation, then sympathy will be very unlikely to work.

Sear and Williamson (1999) described these two themes thus:

Minimization theme: reducing the person's perceived responsibility for the action.
Justification theme: Giving moral justification for the action.

See also

Empathy, Bonding principle, Soft Power

Sear, L. and Williamson, T. (1999). British and American interrogation strategies, in D. Canter and I. Alison (eds) Interviewing and deception, Aldershot: Ashgate

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Site Menu

| Home | Top | Quick Links | Settings |

Main sections: | Disciplines | Techniques | Principles | Explanations | Theories |

Other sections: | Blog! | Quotes | Guest articles | Analysis | Books | Help |

More pages: | Contact | Caveat | About | Students | Webmasters | Awards | Guestbook | Feedback | Sitemap | Changes |

Settings: | Computer layout | Mobile layout | Small font | Medium font | Large font | Translate |

Please help and share:

Quick links

Disciplines

* Argument
* Brand management
* Change Management
* Coaching
* Communication
* Counseling
* Game Design
* Human Resources
* Job-finding
* Leadership
* Marketing
* Politics
* Propaganda
* Rhetoric
* Negotiation
* Psychoanalysis
* Sales
* Sociology
* Storytelling
* Teaching
* Warfare
* Workplace design

Techniques

* Assertiveness
* Body language
* Change techniques
* Closing techniques
* Conversation
* Confidence tricks
* Conversion
* Creative techniques
* General techniques
* Happiness
* Hypnotism
* Interrogation
* Language
* Listening
* Negotiation tactics
* Objection handling
* Propaganda
* Problem-solving
* Public speaking
* Questioning
* Using repetition
* Resisting persuasion
* Self-development
* Sequential requests
* Storytelling
* Stress Management
* Tipping
* Using humor
* Willpower

Principles

Explanations

* Behaviors
* Beliefs
* Brain stuff
* Conditioning
* Coping Mechanisms
* Critical Theory
* Culture
* Decisions
* Emotions
* Evolution
* Gender
* Games
* Groups
* Habit
* Identity
* Learning
* Meaning
* Memory
* Motivation
* Models
* Needs
* Personality
* Power
* Preferences
* Research
* Relationships
* SIFT Model
* Social Research
* Stress
* Trust
* Values

Theories

* Alphabetic list
* Theory types

And

– About
– Guest Articles
– Blog!
– Books
– Changes
– Contact
– Guestbook
– Quotes
– Students
– Webmasters

| Home | Top | Menu | Quick Links |

© Changing Works 2002-
Massive Content — Maximum Speed