Cognitive Interview Flashcards
What is the cognitive interview (CI)?
A method of interviewing eyewitnesses to retrieve more accurate memories using four main techniques based on cognitive psychology.
Who developed the cognitive interview and when?
Ronald Fisher and Edward Geiselman in 1992.
Why was the cognitive interview developed?
To improve EWT by using techniques grounded in psychological understanding of memory.
What is ‘report everything’?
Witnesses are encouraged to recall every detail, even if it seems irrelevant, as it may trigger other memories.
What is ‘reinstate the context’?
Witnesses mentally recreate the environment and emotions of the event, helping overcome context-dependent forgetting.
What is ‘reverse the order’?
Witnesses recall events in a different chronological order to prevent expectations and dishonesty influencing the recall.
What is ‘change perspective’?
Witnesses recall the event from someone else’s viewpoint to disrupt schema-driven recall (e.g. from the perpetrator’s or another witness’s view).
What is the enhanced cognitive interview (ECI)?
A version of CI developed by Fisher et al. (1987) that adds social and communication techniques to improve recall (e.g. knowing when to make eye contact, reducing distractions, asking open questions).
What are some additional features of the ECI?
Reducing anxiety, minimising distractions, allowing witnesses to speak slowly, and using open-ended questions.
What is a practical limitation of the CI?
It is time-consuming and requires special training, which many police forces cannot fully implement (Kebbell and Wagstaff, 1996).
What did Milne and Bull (2002) find about CI elements?
All four techniques improve recall, but report everything and context reinstatement are the most effective together.
What did Köhnken et al. (1999) find about the ECI?
ECI increased correct information by 81%, but also increased the amount of incorrect information (false positives).
Why is variation in CI use a problem for evaluating effectiveness?
Different police forces and studies use different versions of CI or ECI, making it hard to compare results or generalise findings.
What is a strength of the cognitive interview overall?
It is based on solid psychological principles (e.g. encoding specificity) and has real-world practical benefits for improving police investigations.
How can the CI be applied to a real-life scenario?
A police officer might ask a witness to mentally return to the scene, describe everything they saw, reverse the order of events, and consider what another person may have seen—enhancing recall accuracy.
What do CI techniques suggest about memory?
That memories are often available but not accessible, and specific cues can help retrieve them.
