Eye Witness Testimony (Memory) Flashcards
Eye witness Tesitmony
The ability of people to remember the details of past events which hey have observed.
Bartlett (1932)
Argued memory is not an accurate recording of events; its reconstructed in recalling and may produce errors (influenced by schemas)
Misleading information
incorrect information given to the EW usually after the event
Leading Question
Questions that imply a certain answer and can influence how a memory is recalled
Leading questions can influence how memory is recalled
What is this due to?
Substitution bias (change in the memory)
Response bias (emotional pressure to give a particular response)
Post event discussion (PED)
- Witnesses may discuss what they have seen with other co-witnesses.
- Can alter the accuracy of another witnesses recollection
- They may combine misinformation from other witnesses with their own memories
- Memory conformity (go along with others account for approval)
Evaluation of Misleading Information
Loftus and Palmer 1974
Participants told to estimate the speed of a car crash
Different verbs were used (smash and bump) and those given smashed estimated a higher speed
Suggests leading questions can affect the accuracy of people’s memories of events
Anxiety
- An unpleasant emotional state of fearing that something bad will happen
- Happens in stressful situations
- Feelings of concern, tension and physiological changes (increased hr)
Does high anxiety levels increase or decrease recall?
Both
Decreased recall due to weapon effect
Increased recall due improvements in alertness and awareness
The Tunnel theory
An explanation for the weapon-focus effect is that the weapon narrows the field of attention and thus reduced the information to be stored
Yerkes-Dodson Law
Law of arousal
Suggests EWT is very good when the person had medium anxiety levels
Suggests EWT is very poor when the person had low or high anxiety levels
(Basically Inverted U from PE)
PED Evaluations
+ Bodner found when participants were warned about the danger of PED, witnesses changed their EWT less
- Lab research found EWT that has no emotional impact on the participant can be argued to have low validity when applied to real EWT
Positive Evaluations of Anxiety
Johnson & Scott found participants were weapon focused due to anxiety caused by the knife
Negative Evaluations of Anxiety
Deceitful research that causes anxiety breaks ethical guidelines (informed consent/protection from harm)
What 3 factors make EWT inaccurate?
Anxiety
Leading Questions
Post-event discussion
What was Fishers type of interview?
Standard interview in which police asked quick, direct and closed questions
Problems with the standard interview
Witnesses couldn’t talk freely and were frequently interrupted
What was the improvement of the cognitive interview and who proposed it?
Fisher and Geiselman proposed the cognitive interview
4 components of the Cognitive Interview
Context reinstatement
Report everything
Recall from a changed perspective
Recall in a reversed order
Context reinstatement
Mentally returning to the crime scene in order t trigger cues
Report everything
All details, even if they seem irrelevant, mentioned
Recall from a changed perspective
Consider from perspective of other witnesses/ perpetrators to disrupt schema
Recall in reverse order
Switch timeline to check accuracy of recall
Positive Evaluation of Cognitive Interview
Milne and Bull found each aspect of CI produced a similar level of recall suggesting no one aspect is more important
Negative Evaluations of Cognitive Interview
Time consuming and requires more time than officers have available
Not effective with very young children as they can only see the world from their own perspective
