Eye-witness testimony - anxiety Flashcards
How does anxiety have a negative effect on recall?
Physiological arousal in the body prevents us from paying attention to important cues and therefore recall is worse
Who experimented on how anxiety negatively affects EWT?
Johnson and Scott (1976)
What was Johnson and Scott’s procedure?
The participants believed they were taking part a lab experiment and were seated in the waiting room
There were two different groups:
1. High anxiety condition - Overheard a heated arguement, smashed glass and then a man walking out of the room with a knife covered in blood
2. Low anxiety condition - Overheard a casual conversation and then a man walking out of the room carrying a pen with grease on his hands
The participants were then shown 50 photos and they had to correctly pick out the man they had seen
Describe the first group in Johnson and Scotts experiment
High anxiety condition - Overheard a heated argument, smashed glass and then a man walking out of the room with a knife covered in blood
Describe the second group in Johnson and Scotts experiment
Low anxiety condition - Overheard a casual conversation and then a man walking out of the room carrying a pen with grease on his hands
What were Johnson and Scotts findings?
49% who had seen the man carrying a pen were able to identify him (low anxiety)
33% were able to identify the man with the knife/ blood (high anxiety)
What were Johnson and Scotts conclusions?
The tunnel theory of memory argues that a witness’s attention is on a weapon (weapon focus) because it is a source of danger and anxiety
How does anxiety have a positive effect on recall?
Witnessing a stressful situation event creates anxiety through physiological arousla within the body - flight or fight is triggered which may improve memory as we become aware of cues in the situation
Describe the procedure that John and Judith used to experiment the positive effect that anxiety has on EWT
Real-life crime: a gun-shop owner shot a thief dead. There were 21 witnesses - 13 agreed to participate in the study. Participants interview 4/5 months after the event and compared to the original police interviews. Witnesses rated how stressed they felt at the time of the incident
What were John and Judith’s findings and conclusions?
Witnesses were very accurate and very little changed after 5 months - some details were less accurate (colours, age, height, weight). Those who reported the highest level of stress were most accurate. This suggested that anxiety does not have a detrimental effect on the accuracy of eyewitness memory and may even enhance it
Describe how the inverted U theory links to EWT anxiety
Yerkes and Dodson (1908) agued that the relationship between performance and arousal/ stress is curvilinear rather than linear
Deffenbacher (1983) reviewed 21 studies of EWT and notified contradictory findings of the effects of anxiety. When you witness a crime/ accident you become emotionally and physically aroused. Lower levels of anxiety produce lower levels of recall accuracy. Recall accuracy increases up to an optimum point. A drastic decline is seen once the eyewitness passes this point
What are the problems with the inverted U theory?
This theory ignores the fact that anxiety has many elements - cognitive, behavioral, emotional and physical. It focuses more on the physical arousal and assumes that this is the only aspect linked to eyewtiness testimony - too simplistic?
Give the 3 limitations of EWT anxiety
- May test surprise and not anxiety - Participants may focus on the weapon because they are surprised rather than scared. Pickel (1998) conducted an experiment in a hairdressers using the following four items - a handgun, a wallet, scissors and a raw chicken.
High anxiety, low unusualness = scissors
High unusualness = chicken/ handgun
Eyewitness accuracy was significantly poorer in the high unusualness conditions - chicken and handgun. This suggests that the weapon focus effect is due to unusualness rather than anxiety - Ethical issues - Creating anxiety is potentially unethical - could cause psychological harm. Real-life studies are beneficial as they have already witnessed an event. Ethical issues don’t challenge the findings but they raise questions about conducting the research
- Demand characteristics - Most participants in a controlled lab are aware that they are watching a staged film and will then be asked about it. They may work out what is being required of them and change their responses. Because of this the research is not actually measuring the accuracy of EWT, therefore reducing the validity of the research
Outline Parker’s et al (2006) study on anxiety
Interviewed people affected by a hurricane and saw if there was a relationship between memory of events and the amount of damage to their homes (a measure of anxiety).
Was Parker’s et al external validity high or low?
The external validity was high as the participants had experienced real anxiety in an everyday setting.
What were Parker’s findings?
Moderate levels of anxiety (neither high nor low) associated with high accuracy of EWT. Anxiety can have a positive or negative effect on recall depending on how extreme it is.
What are the positives and negatives of Parker’s study?
Positive: The study did not only investigate high and low levels of anxiety but moderate levels too, enabling a better understanding of the relationship between anxiety and witness accuracy.
Negative: Anxiety was operationalised by measuring the amount of damage done to homes. This may not reflect their experienced anxiety.
Outline Valentine and Meson (2009) study on anxiety
Visitors to a horror labyrinth were divided into low anxiety and high anxiety on basis of heart monitor. They were asked to describe an individual encountered in the labyrinth.
Was Valentine and Mesout study’s external validity high or low?
Fairly high. It was a real-life setting though the anxiety was not caused by anything really threatening.
What were Valentine and Mesout’s findings?
Low anxiety associated with high accuracy of EWT. Anxiety has a negative effect on recall.
Give positives and negatives of Valentine and Mesout’s study
Positive: Two measures of anxiety including heart monitor makes it an accurate measure of anxiety.
Negative: Quasi-experiment so no random allocation to conditions and participant variables may have acted as confounding variables.
