Children hate the volley of questions that they get from adults. Along with all the children I’ve worked with therapeutically over the years, my own children have told me that adult questions are like Policeman questions. Charming! When I’m trying to establish rapport and build a relationship with a child, the last thing I want to sound like is a Police person.
The way you frame and use your questions is the trick. While questions are useful when starting a relationship, they can also quickly stifle it. Useful questions don’t just happen; they need planning and placement in a framework of guidelines to allow a new relationship to flourish.
Mebe stated that he wanted an adult to ask him if he had been sexually abused. However, if the question had come unexpectedly, I doubt that Mebe would have been able to answer. Last article we looked at a three-part framework of how to ask the hard questions of a child that you suspect may have been sexually abused. Today we’re going to look at:
Open-ended questions: As a rule always ask open-ended questions when dealing with children who you suspect have been abused. These questions are designed to get more information than a “yes” or “no” answer (a closed question) and they do not lead the child to give a particular answer. They are open, and allow the child to give a whole range of information, information that you may not see as relevant but may well be important further down the track.
A “why” question is closed and will typically be answered with “I Dunno,” or “Just cos.” Open-ended questions begin with when, where, what, who, how, could you/would you tell me, etc. When building rapport, open-ended questions allow you to examine what a child likes to do and how they best receive information. For example, “What sort of games do you like to play?” From this question you can jump into your probing questions, “When you play those games with Grandad, who else is around?” “Whereabouts are you when you play those games?” “What would happen if you told someone about the tickle games?” If you asked, “Is the tickle game a secret?” (closed question) you may miss valuable information around the child’s fear of telling, how the child may view their parent’s reaction or even if the tickle game is purely innocent.
By asking open-ended questions, you are doing an assessment and gathering a whole host of information without appearing too Policeman like.
If I had been fortunate enough to work with Mebe when he was a child, I would have asked open-ended questions around his behavior before I went anywhere near the hard questions about possible sexual abuse. I would have discovered as much information as I could about his life, his circumstances and when his behavior changed. With all of the background information in my head I would then ask the hard question in the framework described in the last article: Mebe, I’m just wondering about what’s happened to you? In my experience, lots of kids who do things like you do often end up telling me that someone is sexually abusing them. You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to because if it’s real horrible I might have to tell the police so I can get some help. What’s the most horrible thing that’s happened to you?”
By asking like this, I am allowing Mebe to save face and not tell me, but I’ve also planted a seed in his head to let him know I suspect and that I can help. If I simply asked, “Is someone sexually abusing you,” I would run the risk of Mebe closing down emotionally because he has nowhere to go to save face and redirect the conversation to something more palatable. He would also not have had the opportunity to test if I am a safe person to disclose to.
Open-ended questions are very important when you are trying to get as much information as you can without contaminating evidence or leading a child. Apart from the great therapeutic value of open-ended questions, they also encourage the non-abused child to think analytically, organize and express their thoughts and provide their knowledge base on whatever the topic of conversation is. Use open-ended questions today – you may be surprised at the information you’ll receive in return.
For other articles around child sexual abuse please browse my article list.