2.4 key question (cognitive)

Question 1

what is the key question?

Answer 1

is eyewitness testimony too unreliable to trust?

Question 2

what are the facts of wrongful eyewitness?

Answer 2

• 375 DNA evidence-linked exonerations between 1989 and 2020 where 69% of cases were based on eyewitness misidentification
• on average, 9.1 years of a persons life is lost per wrongful conviction
• those who have been wrongfully convicted can get up to £1m compensation for damage to physical and mental health, as well as reputation

Question 3

what is an example of wrongful conviction?

Answer 3

• Ronald cotton
• wrongfully convicted for the sexual assault of 2 women and 2 counts of burglary
• cotton’s conviction relied on one witness and she was wrong
• DNA evidence proved he wasn’t guilty and he was released 11 years later

Question 4

what are the two factors that affect reliability of identifying criminals?

Answer 4

1. reconstructive memory
2. weapons focus

Question 5

how can reconstructive memory affect eyewitnesses identifying criminals?

Answer 5

1. schema — witnesses may use schemas (past experiences) to incorrectly fill in gaps in their memory resulting in wrongful conviction (e.g thinking the criminal was black but he was white)
2. confabulation — witness changing their memory of the criminal based on what makes sense to them (e.g thought criminal was holding a gun but it was a knife, as a gun makes sense to the person)
3. levelling — leaving out information the witness doesn’t deem important (for eg the clothes they were wearing) which leads to wrongful conviction
4. rationalisation — adding information based on their schema (for eg they were holding a knife when they weren’t)