Accuracy Of Eyewitness Testimony: Misleading Information

Question 1

What are the 3 main things in misleading information

Answer 1

Leading questions
Misleading information
Post-event discussion

Question 2

What is the key study supporting the effect of learning questions?

Answer 2

Loftus and Palmer
45 students shown car accident videos, given questionnaire, important question “about how fast were the cars going when they hit each other?”

Groups got: hit, smashed, collided, bumped and contacted

Findings:
Smashed 40.8
Collided 39.3
Bumped 38.1
Hit 34.0
Contacted 31.8

Experiment 2:
3 groups shown car accident video, given questionnaire, wait 1 week, given more questions, important question “did you see any broken glass?”

   Smashed  Hit  Control Yes  16              7     6 No    34             43   44

Question 3

What are the 2 areas of post even discussion?

Answer 3

Conformity effect - discussing with co-witnesses causing mistakes
Repeat interviewing - interviewer asking leading questions and changing EW memory of events

Question 4

What is eyewitness testimony?

Answer 4

Eyewitness memory goes through three stages:

1. The witness encodes into LTM details of the event and the persons involved
2. Witness retains information for a period of time, memories may start to be lost or modified
3. The witness retrieves the information. The presence of appropriate cues may help in retrieval