eyewitness testimony:research

Question 1

loftus and palmer

Answer 1

procedure: Lab experiment- 45 Ps shown film of car accident and after asked “how fast were the cars going when they …. each other?” using one of 5 different verbs such as contacted or smashed.
findings: The verb used affected the estimated speed with smashed being the highest at 41mph and contacted the lowest at 32mph.

Question 2

gabbert et al

Answer 2

procedure: Pairs of participants viewed simulated crime event on video from different angles which meant they could see things their partner couldn’t. In condition 1 the participants were given timed to discuss what they saw before being asked about the event but in the control condition they had no PED
findings: 71% of those who had PED recalled info they had not seen whilst 0% of the control group recalled unseen info

Question 3

yulie and cutshall

Answer 3

procedure: Investigated witnesses to a real-life armed robbery in Canada 4 months after the event and were asked to recall details of the crime however the researchers included 2 misleading questions
findings: All witnesses were accurate with none being influenced by the misleading questions

Question 4

christiansan and hubinette

Answer 4

procedure: 110 real life eyewitnesses of bank robberies in Sweden, including bank clerks who were directly threatened, and onlookers were interviewed 4-15 months after the event
findings: All had better than 75% accurate recall but those with high anxiety remembered the most

Question 5

johnson and scott

Answer 5

procedure: Ps invited to a lab and were told to wait in reception then they heard an argument and saw someone walk out of the lab either holding a pen or a bloodied letter opener. They were then shown 50 photos and asked to identify the individual
findings: The Ps in the no weapon condition has correct recall 49% of the time whilst those in the weapon condition were only correct 33% of the time

Question 6

gielsman et al

Answer 6

procedure: 51 Ps shown a video of simulated violent crime and were interviewed 48 hrs later to recall details either using a standard police interview, a cognitive interview or under hypnosis
findings: Standard police interview- 29% accuracy Cognitive interview- 41% accuracy Hypnosis- 38% accuracy

Question 7

fisher et al

Answer 7

procedure: Trained detectives in Miami police station to use cognitive interviews with real eyewitnesses and compared interview performance before and after training.
findings: After training the detectives gained as much as 47% more useful info from eyewitnesses to real life crimes.

Question 8

kebbell and wagstaff

Answer 8

procedure: CI techniques are much more time consuming and require extensive training that standard interviews don’t need. Often police don’t have enough time to use all 4 techniques involved
findings: Many police officers didn’t use cognitive interviews in less serious crimes as they didn’t have the time