cognitive interview

Question 1

what is a cognitive interrview?

Answer 1

• a method, devised by Gieselman, designed to assist the police in interviewing witnesses of a crime
• uses different retrival techniques to prompt the witness to remember more about the crime

Question 2

sequence and structure of a cognitive interview :

Answer 2

1. inteoduction
2. controlling the interviewer
3. open-ended narration
4. probing for detaiils
5. review important questions
6. closing the interview (evaluation)

Question 3

why is it important for an interviewer to build a rapport with the interviewee?

Answer 3

to establish a comfortable atmosphere where both parties feel engaged by the content of the discussion

Question 4

what are the four main featured of a cognitive interview?

Answer 4

1. context reinstatement
2. report everything
3. change the order
4. change the perspective

Question 5

context reinstatement

Answer 5

where the interviewer tries to mentally recreate the environmental and personal context of the crime of the witness. by asking them about their general activities and feelings on the day of the crime

Question 6

change the perspective (reporting the event from different perspectives)

Answer 6

where witnesses are asked to report the incident differently, describing what they think other witnesses might have seen

Question 7

change the order (describing the event in several orders)

Answer 7

• recounting the incident in a different narrative order
• gieselman and fisher proposed that due to the recenccy effect, people tend to recall more recent events more clearly than others
• witnesses should be encouraged to work backwards from the end to the beginning

Question 8

why iis recalling backwards more effectie than recalling in chronological order?

Answer 8

• when events are recalled in forward order, witnesses reconstruct based on their schemas and this might lead to distortion
• If the order is changed, they are more accurate as they are less likely to use their schemas

Question 9

report everything

Answer 9

• where witnesses are asked to report every detail, even if they think that detail is trivial
• this is because, apparently, unimportant detail might act as a trigger for key information about the event