Interrogation tactics

Techniques > Interrogation > Interrogation tactics

Interrogation in practice ranges from domestic questioning to legal investigation to military detail. These contexts and the legal and moral frameworks involved will constraint the methods and styles that are permissible. Professional interrogators have a potentially large number of techniques at their disposal and the more extreme methods are only very briefly described here.

• Already know: Say that you already know what is required.
• Authority and power: Play on symbolic authority.
• Dire consequences: Exaggerate the bad things that may happen.
• Easiest way out: Exchange required information for release.
• Informality: Being their friend and catching them in vulnerable moments.
• Inquisition: Sustaining an ideology through confession.
• Lie detectors: Using the polygraph and other machines to detect lies.
• Only way out: There is one choice: confession or some form of extinction.
• Sympathy: Be sympathetic to their situation.
• Extreme tactics: used in military and other areas.

See also

Negotiation, Appeal to Fear, Questioning techniques, Stress, Coping Mechanisms