Cognitive interview

Question 1

What is the basic police interview ?

Answer 1

• an interviewer does most of the talking
• specific, closed questions
• witnesses discouraged from adding extra information
• predetermined questions
• unintentionally leading questions

Question 2

What are the 4 stages of the cognitive interview technique ?

Answer 2

Geiselman
1. Context reinstatement - witness asked to mentally recreate the context of the event (state + context dependent forgetting)
2. Change the sequences - witness asked to recall events in a different order
3. Change in perspectives - the witness is asked to recall the events in different perspectives
4. Report everything - witnesses are asked to report every single detail that they remember

Question 3

What is the enhanced cognitive interview ?

Answer 3

Fisher - focused on the social dynamics of the interview:
- eye contact
- speaking slowly
- open-ended questions
- minimising distractions

Question 4

What is a strength of the cognitive interview ?

Answer 4

Geilsman + Fischer
- participants viewed a video of a violent crime
- 48 hours later asked questions using cognitive interview with 3 techniques
- lab experiment, independent group design, volunteer sample
Results: number of correctly recalled facts was higher for cognitive interview compared to the other technique
CI: 41 correct
SI: 29 correct

Question 5

What are limitation’s pf the cognitive interview ?

Answer 5

Supporting studies
-Milne and Bull
- all 4 elements of the cognitive interview produce more accurate recall from a witness compared to the standard interview
- However, context reinstatement and report everything are the most successful combination together
- This is inline with the attitudes of police officers

Practical issues:
- time consuming and expensive training
- some police forces don’t have resources for specific training