Cognitive Interview Flashcards
What is the Cognitive interview?
The CI is a procedure used by the police when interviewing witnesses to crimes. It was based on the research of psychologists like Loftus, who has shown that memory is not like a video camera. It involves using multiple retrieval strategies to increase the accuracy of memories
Who came up with the CI?
Fischer and Gieselman (1985,1992)
What are the four components of the cognitive interview?
- Report everything
- Context reinstatement
- Recall in reverse order
- Recall from changed perspective
What is involved in the component ‘report everything’?
- recall everything, even trivial details
- tell police every single detail
- irrelevant details may trigger other memories or actually be important
- creates network in brain
What is involved in the component ‘context reinstatement’ ?
- ask to mentally recreate scene
- all senses
- could act as a context cue to trigger other memories of the event
What is involved in the component ‘recall in reverse order’ ?
- ask to recall events from different chronological orders
- helps accuracy and prevents dishonesty as it is harder to lie
- may help recall things that don’t fit in with schemas
What is involved in the component ‘recall from a changed perspective’ ?
- recall event from someone else’s point of view - this could be the victims, the perpetrators or another witnesses
- may help avoid schemas that can effect recall
Summarise evaluations of the cognitive interview
- research evidence that it is effective - kohnken et al found a 34% increase in correct information
- however research lacks ecological validity
- not effective if used incorrectly - only 4 hours of training given
- applications limited - police worried about large amount of incorrect information recalled and time taken
Additional features from Fischer et al
- No distractions
- active listening
- open questions
- no interruptions
