EWT: anxiety Flashcards
why would anxiety have a negative effect on recall?
weapon focus
what does anxiety create within the body
physical arousal
what does phsyical arousal prevent us from doing?
paying attention to the important cues, causing recall to be worse
whats one way of studying anxiety and EWT?
to look at the effect of the presence of a weapon
who did the key study on this?
Johnson and Scott (1976)
what was their procedure?
p’s believed they were taking part in a lab study, in the waiting room the p’s were in a low-anxiety condition and head a casual convo in the next room, a man walks out with a pen and grease on his hands.
Other group of p’s heard a heated argument and the sound of breaking glass, a man walked out with a knife and covered in blood (high anxiety condition)
what were the findings and the conclusion? (Johnson and Scott (1976))
the p’s later picked out a man from a set of 50 photos, 49% who saw the pen pciked correctly, only 33% of the people who saw the knife could pick correctly
whats the tunnel theory of memory?
argues that people have enhanced memory for central events.
what are the limitations?
- they may not have tested anxiety, the witnesses may have been shocked rather than scared.
how does Pikels study support the limitation?
Pickel (1998) conducted experiment using scissors, handgun, raw chichen and a wallet as hand held items in a hairdressing video, eyewitness accuracy was poorer in unusal situations.
whats a strength of this?
Valentine and Meson (2009) used an objective measure (heart-rate) to divide p’s into groups of highand low anxiety. there was a clear disruption in p’s ability to recall details od situation. 17% of h-a p’s correctly identified actor, 75% of l-a p’s did.
why would anxeity have a positive effect on recall?
the fight or flight response of the body is triggered, causing alertness.
Who did the key study of this?
Yuille and Cutshall (1986)
what was their procedure?
They took 13 of 21 witnesses to a real robberey in vancouver where the ownder dhot a theif dead. they were interviewed 4 months after the incident and were compared to the origional interviews after. Accuracy = number of details in each account and stress rated on a 7 point scale and any problems after the event
what were the findings?
Witnesses were very accurate in accounts, little change after 5 months. some details such as height, weight and colour estimates changed. those who reported higher levels of stress had a higher recall (88% compared to 75% of the less-stressed group).
