Cognitive Interview Flashcards
What is the CI?
Encourages witnesses to recreate original crime to increase accessibility of stored information
Who developed the CI?
Geiselman et al (1984)
What is mental reinstatement of original context?
Questions include
- “What was the weather like?”
- “What objects were there?”
- “ What had you been doing?”
Aim is to make memories more accessible and need proper appropriate contextual and emotional cues to retrieve memories
What is the report everything technique?
Report anything even if it is irrelevant and questions include:
-“please do not leave anything out”
- “tell anything that pops up into your head even if you think it is unimportant”
Connection of memories may help ability to retrieve another
What is the change in order technique?
Reversing order when the events occurred, recollection is influenced by schema, e.g. thinking about a restaurant you visited, recollection may be influenced on what normally happens, being seated.
What is the changing perspective technique?
Imagining what other witnesses would have seen
Research on effectiveness of the CI:
34% increase on effectiveness on correct information generated by the CI. Milne and Bull (2002) found when using combinations of ‘report everything’ and ‘mental reinstatement’ their recall was a lot higher then just using one of these components
Quality may suffer:
CI is designed to increase quantity of information and not the quality. When the CI was used, Kohnken et al (1999) found 81% increase in correct information but also a 61% increase of incorrect information
Comparisons are difficult:
Some police will only use certain components which means it is hard to establish overall effectiveness of the technique when using all components
