Cognitive interviews - A01 Flashcards
What did Fisher and Geiselman (1992) argue?
They argued that EWT could be improved if police used better techniques when interviewing witnesses.
They recommended that such techniques should be based on psychological insight to how memory works
What are the four main techniques of cognitive interviews?
- Report everything
- Reinstate the context
- Reverse the order
- Change the perspective
What is the first technique of cognitive interviews?
Report everything:
Witnesses are encouraged to include every single detail of the event, even if it may seem irrelevant or the witness doesn’t feel confident about it. Seemingly trivial details may be important and may trigger other memories
What is the second technique of cognitive interviews?
Reinstate the context:
The witnesses should return to the original crime scene in their mind and imagine the environment and emotions. This is related to context-depedent forgetting
What is the third technique of cognitive interviews?
Reverse the order:
Events should be recalled froma different order than thier original sequence. This is done to prevent reporting the expectations of how the event must have happened rather than reporting the actual events
What is the fourth technique of cognitive interviews?
Change perspective:
Witnesses should recall the event from other people’s perspectives. This is done to disrupt the effect of expectations and the effect of schema on recall. The schema you have for a particular setting generates expectations of what would have happened and it is the schema that is recalled rather than what actually happened
What is the enhanced cognitive interview?
Fisher et al. (1987) developed some additional elements of the CI to focus on the social dynamics of the interaction
E.g when to establish eye contact and when the relinquish it
ECI includes ideas such as:
* Reducing eye witness anxiety
* Minimising distractions
* Getting the witness to speak slowly
* Asking open-ended questions
