Factors affecting the accuracy of eyewitness testimony: Misleading Information

Question 1

What was the aim of Loftus and Palmer’s research on EWT?

Answer 1

• To investigate the effect of misleading information (in the form of leading questions) on eye witness memory

Question 2

What is meant by the term misleading information?

Answer 2

• Discussion between witnesses following an incident that was witnessed by multiple people, potentially from different view points and concerning the incident witnessed

Question 3

What was the procedure for Loftus and Palmers research?

Answer 3

• Their sample consisted of 45 American students who were divided into 5 groups of 9
• All the participants watched a video of a car crash and were then asked specific questions about the speed of cars.
• Loftus & Palmer manipulated the verb used in the question e.g
  “how fast were the cars going when they smashed/collided/bumped/hit/contacted

Question 4

What was the IV & DV in Loftus & Palmers experiment?

Answer 4

Independant Variable- Words used e.g smash/hit
Dependant variable- Speed estimated that the car hit

Question 5

What can we conclude from Lofus & Palmers experiment?

Answer 5

The wording of a question can change the memory of the same event

Question 6

What are the two bias that affect memory?

Answer 6

Response bias- Wording of the question has no real effect on the participants memories, but influences how they decide to answer

Substitution bias- The wording of the leading question actually changes the recall of the participants memory of the film clip

Question 7

What was one strength of Loftus and Palmer’s research for misleading information?

Answer 7

OS is that it took place as a lab experiment
for example the 45 participants watched a video of a car crash and because it was in a lab the extrenuous variables were limated for example noise from other people, disturbances in the environment & stress were all similalry controlled & so did not impact participants. This means the internal validity of the research was high & caus and effect of leading questins can be repeated

Question 8

What was the research conducted on post-event discussion?

Answer 8

Gabberts et al (2003)
To investigate whether post event discussion can affect witness memory

Question 9

What was Gabbert et al’s procedure for her study?

Answer 9

Studied participants in pairs
Each participant watched a video of the same crime but filmed from different points of view.
This meant that each participant could see elements in the event that the other could not.

For example, only one of the participants could see the title of a book being carried by a young woman

Question 10

What were the findings of Gabbet et al?

Answer 10

Researchers found that 71% of the participants mistakenly recalled aspects of the event that they did not see in the video but had picked up the discussion.

The corresponding figure in a control group where there was no discussion was 0%

Conclusion: This experiment is evident for memory conformity

Question 11

What are the strengths and weaknesses of Gabberts research?

Answer 11

Strengths
* High ecological validity- supports the way people act
* Extrenuous variables are controlled as it is conducted on a lab therefore is has high internal validity

Weaknesses
* Deception is unethical
* Participants were decieved because they were told only about the differing sounds of the video but were decieved by the different angles

Question 12

What is one strength of research into misleading information?

Answer 12

• It has important practical uses in the criminal justice system
  -Consequences of inaccurate EWT can be very serious.
• Loftus believed that leading questions can have such a distorting affect on memory that police officers need to be very careful as to how they phrase their questions.
• Shows that psychologists can help to improve the way the legal system works especially by protecting innocent people from faulty convivtions based on unreliable EWT

Question 13

Give one limitation of the substitution explanation.

Answer 13

• EWT is more accurate for some aspects of an event than others
  e.g. Sutherland and Hayne showed ppts a video clipm, when ppts were later asked misleading questions their recall was more accurate for central details of the event than peripheral ones
  Presumably ppts attention mwas focused on central features of the event & these memories were relatively resistant to misleading information.