In intrafamilial Child Sexual Assault (CSA) cases, siblings often confide in each other about their abuse. It is important for defense attorneys to question siblings about their conversations surrounding abuse to assess their credibility and honesty. The present study qualitatively analyzes the content of questions defense attorneys are asking siblings in intrafamilial CSA cases across 67 transcripts. These questions were then categorized into four content categories which included confiding in which the child talked to their sibling about their abuse, co-preparing in which siblings discussed what they would say in court, disclosure in which they discussed whom to disclose the abuse to, and awareness in which they try to ascertain if a sibling was aware of another sibling’s abuse. Within the 67 selected transcripts 1,384 questions were asked about siblings but only 18% (n = 250) were about conversations between the siblings. Of these identified questions, 63.6% of questions asked about confiding, 13.6 % questions asked about co-preparing, 20% of questions asked about disclosure, and 2% of questions asked about awareness. This may indicate a need for these questions to be asked during the child’s forensic interview to elicit an accurate account. Children’s forensic interviews use protocols to help children produce detailed and accurate accounts of abuse and in trials children are likely to experience distress while providing testimony which may lead to a child misremembering or forgetting details of their abuse. Analyzing this study’s qualitative data could aid children undergoing legal procedures when reporting abuse.

Most of the existing literature on how alleged sexual offenders interact with children is based on the perspectives of offenders themselves. Few studies have explored children's accounts of their relationship with their perpetrator before the abuse and/or disclosure. To address this gap, the current study investigated children’s reported first and later impressions of their alleged sexual perpetrators. Using qualitative content coding, we examined 34 transcripts of forensic interviews relating to child sexual abuse and categorized the impressions into three main types: positive, neutral, and negative. A majority of the first impressions were positive or neutral while most of the later impressions were negative. Impressions were complex and varied widely within a single category. Analyzing children’s rationale for their first impressions can provide insight into their thought processes as well as allow for an analysis of the perpetrator behavior. The examination of first and later impressions can be a crucial variable for practitioners and scholars to study, as it can quickly assess the evolution of the child-offender relationship and elicit information about perpetrator tactics such as grooming and seduction.