Factors affecting the accuracy of eyewitness testimony: Anxiety

Question 1

Why does Anxiety have a negative effect on recall?

Answer 1

Weapon focus

Anxiety creates a psychological arousal in the body which prevents us from paying attention to cues so recall is worse.

Presence of a weapon creates anxiety so we focus on it, reducing witness’s recall for other details of the event

Question 2

How did Johnson and Scott study Anxiety? (negative)

Answer 2

• Lab study
• participants heard a casual conversation next door whilst they are seated in a ‘waiting room’
• then saw a man walk past carrying a pen with grease on his hands
• other participants overheard a heated argument, accompanied by the sound of breaking glass
• saw a man walk out of the room holding a knife covered in blood
• this was the high anxiety condition

Question 3

What did Johnson and Scott find?

Answer 3

• participants picked out the man from 50 photos
• 49% who saw him carry pen could identify him
• only 33% who saw him carry the knife could identify him
  The tunnel theory of memory argues people have enhanced memory for certain events. Weapon focus as a result of anxiety can have this effect

Question 4

Why does anxiety have a positive effect on recall?

Answer 4

Psychological arousal creates the ‘fight or flight’ response

This increases alertness which may improve memory for the even as we become more aware of cues in the situation

Question 5

How did Yuille and Cutshall study the effects of anxiety? (positive)

Answer 5

• study of an actual shooting in a gun shop
• shop owner shot a thief dead
• 21 witnesses, 13 took part in study
• interviewed 4/5 months after the incident
• interviews then compared to original police interview at the time of the shooting
• accuracy determined by number of details reported in each account/response
• witnesses asked how stressed they felt at the time of the incident (on a 7 point scale) and whether they had emotional problems since the event (insomnia/sleeplessness)

Question 6

What did Yuille and Cutshall find?

Answer 6

• witnesses were very accurate
• little change in amount recalled after five months though some details were less accurate (colour of items, estimations of weight etc)
  participants who reported high levels of stress were the most accurate (88% compared to 75% for less stressed group)
  This suggests that anxiety does not have a detrimental effect on the accuracy of eyewitness testimony in a real-world context and may even enhance it

Question 7

How can we explain the contradictory findings?

Answer 7

Yerkes-Dodson law (inverted U theory)

When we witness a crime/event we become emotionally and physically aroused

low arousal = low accuracy
high arousal = high accuracy

There is an optimal level of arousal, which is the point of maximum accuracy. If a person/witness becomes more aroused, then there recall suffers a drastic decline

Question 8

Evaluation of Anxiety in EWT

Answer 8

Support for negative effects:
support study showed that people with higher heart rates (high and low heart rate groups) were unable to recall details about the actor in the London Dungeons labyrinth.
This shows that high anxiety can have a negative effect on the immediate eyewitness recall of a stressful event

Support for Positive effects:
- Another group studied witnesses to actual bank robberies in Sweden
- some involved (workers)
- some not involved (bystanders)
- directly involved = higher anxiety
- 75% accuracy with all witnesses with direct victims even more accurate
These findings from actual crimes confirm that anxiety does not reduce the accuracy of recall for eyewitnesses and may even enhance it

Counterpoint:
- the interviews took place months after the crime
- participants could have discussed post event
- lack of control over confounding variables
This might be responsible for these findings, invalidating their support

Problems with inverted U theory:
- ignores the fact that that anxiety has many elements (cognitive, behavioural, physical, emotional)
- only focuses on physical and assumes that this is the only on linked to EWT
- the way we think about the situation may also be important (cognitive)

Unusualness not anxiety:
- Kerri Pickel (1998)
- participants were surprised at what they saw not scared
- another study tested eyewitness accuracy by taking scissors, a handgun, a wallet, or a raw chicken in a hairdressing salon video (scissors = high anxiety, low unusualness)
- accuracy was significantly poorer in the high unusualness condition (chicken and handgun)
This suggests weapon focus effect is to do with unusualness rather than anxiety/threat and therefore tells us nothing specifically about the effects of anxiety on EWT.