Cognitive Interview Flashcards
Who developed the cognitive interview and what is it?
Geiselman & fisher 1992
- way to improve the accuracy of ewt
- takes into account psychological findings about cue-dependent forgetting and has 4 stages designed to stimulate as many cues as possible to maximise different retrieval routes
Stage 1 - REPORT EVERYTHING
Witnesses encouraged to include every single detail of the event even if it seems irrelevant as they may trigger other important memories
Stage 2 - REINSTATE THE CONTEXT
Witness should return to the original crime scene in their mind and imagine the environment and their emotions
This is related to context dependent forgetting
Stage 3 - REVERSE THE ORDER
Events should be recalled in a different chronological order to the original sequence to prevent reporting their expectations of how the event must have happened rather than the actual events, also prevents dishonesty
Stage 4 - CHANGE PERSPECTIVE
Witnesses should recall the incident from other peoples perspectives to disrupt the effect of expectations and schemas on recall
Research support - GEISELMAN 1985
Aim: to investigate the effectiveness of the cognitive interview
Method: p’s viewed a film of a violent crime and after 48 hours they were interviewed by a policeman using 1 of 3 methods (cognitive interview, standard interview or interview using hypnosis). Number of facts accurately recalled and number of errors made were recorded.
Findings and conclusion of Geiselmans research
Results: Average number of correctly recalled facts for the cognitive interview=41.2, hypnosis=38.0, standard interview=29.4
No significant difference in the number of errors in each condition
Conclusion: cognitive interview leads to better memory of events with witnesses able to recall more relevant info
Who developed the enhanced cognitive interview and when?
Fisher 1987
What is the enhanced cognitive interview?
Additional elements of the CI to focus on the social dynamics of the interaction and to build a trusting relationship, for example:
- interviewer not distracting the witness
- witness controlling flow of info
- asking open ended questions
- getting witness to speak slowly
- p’s reminded not to guess or say i don’t know
Strength of the enhanced cognitive interview
- researchers combined data from 50 studies and found that the ECI consistently provided more correct info than the standard interview
- shows it has practical benefits and gives the police a greater chance of catching and charging criminals
Limitation - TIME CONSUMING
P - time consuming, takes more time than the standard interview
E - more time needed to establish rapport and special training is needed but forces haven’t been able to provide more than a few hours of this
C - unlikely that the proper version of the CI is used which may explain why police haven’t been impressed by it
Limitation - ENCOURAGES RECALL OF INCORRECT INFO
P - techniques of the CI encourage the recall of incorrect info
E - kohnken et al found an 81% increase or correct info but also a 61% increase of incorrect info when the enhanced CI was compared to a standard interview
C - argued that the fact CI leads to an increase in inaccurate recall is a good reason t improve it rather than abandon it. Also provides more a rate recall which outweighs the increase in accurate info
Strength - EACH STAGE OF THE CI IS VALUABLE
P - each stage of the CI is equally as valuable
E - Milne & bull found each technique produced more info than the standard interview. Found using a combination of report everything and context reinforcement produced better recall than the others
C - suggest at least 2 of the stages of the CI should be used to improve police interviewing of eyewitnesses
