improving the accuracy of EWT Flashcards
What is the cognitive interview?
EWT plays a serious role in the legal system and cases can be built on the witness statements of those who have observed the event- naturally these EWT need to be accurate. It is a method of interviewing eyewitnesses to help them retrieve more accurate memories/information.Based on 4 main techniques that is thought to help recall and improve the accuracy of EWT.
What are the four main techniques that are thought to help recall and improve the accuracy of EWT?
In depth reporting
context reinstatement
narrative re-ordering
reporting from different perspectives.
What’s in-depth reporting?
The first stage is to ask the witness to tell the story of what happened, in their own words, and in as much detail as possible.
There should be no interruptions, and witnesses should be encouraged to report everything that they can recall, even if it seems irrelevant.
The interviewer’s job in this stage is to encourage and support rather than ask questions.
What’s context reinstatement?
This is based on research that has shown that recall is improved when we recall in the same (or similar) context to the one in which the material was learnt.
Police interviewers should encourage the witness to reinstate the context in their mind.
This might mean recalling environmental factors such as the placement of furniture, the temperature, or any particular sounds or smells, as well as recalling how they were feeling or what they were thinking at the time.
Police interviewers may encourage the witness to close their eyes and imagine themselves back in the situation.
What’s narrative re-ordering?
The third stage is to ask the witness to recall the story again but from a different starting point.
For example, they may be asked to start at the end and tell the story backwards, or to start in the middle.
Reporting a story backwards means that later elements provide cues to earlier ones, rather than the other way around.
What’s reporting from different perspectives?
Finally, the witness is asked to tell the story again, but this time from the perspective of another witness.
It is acknowledged that some of this may be speculation but, as with the other stages, this may produce cues that allow the person to recall additional details.
This is also done to disrupt the schema you may have. For example, if it was in a shop and you’re usually getting milk from here, you may falsely recall that this is what you were doing this time, but recalling from another perspective may stop this
What’s the enhancement of EWT?
Fisher et al (1987) added extra elements to the cognitive interview- enhanced cognitive interview (ECI)
These included:
1. A focus on social dynamics between interviewer & interviewee e.g., eye contact.
2. Ways to reduce anxiety, distractions, speech rate & use of open-end questions.
What are the strengths for the ECI?
What are the limitations for the ECI?
POLICE MAYBE MORE RELUCTANT TO USE CI BECAUSE IT IS HIGHLY TIME CONSUMING COMPARED TO A STANDARD POLICE INTERVIEW. CI ALSO REQUIRES SPECIAL TRAINING (£). THIS IS A LIMITATION AS CI MIGHT NOT BE USED AS IT TAKES A LOT OF TIME:TIME THE POLICE MAY NOT HAVE
AS WELL AS BEING COSTLY. MANY POLICE FORCES ARE NOT THAT SUPPORTIVE OF THE CI.
OFTEN INCREASES RECALL OF INACCURATE INFORMATION. KOHNKEN ET AL (1999) FOUND THAT EVEN THOUGH CI INCREASES THE ACCURATE INFORMATION BEING RECALLED IT ALSO INCREASES INACCURATE INFORMATION BEING RECALLED. 81% INCREASE IN ACCURATE INFORMATION RECALLED. 61% INCREASE OF INACCURATE INFORMATION BEING RECALLED.
