improving the accuracy of eyewitness testimony: cognitive interview

Question 1

cognitive interview : Fisher & Geiselman (1992)

Answer 1

• said that EWT could be improved if the police use better techniques when interviewing witnesses

Question 2

Report everything

Answer 2

• witnesses encouraged to recall every single detail ( may not be relevant or witness not feel confident)
• events they think are unimportant may actually be important and trigger other memories

Question 3

reinstate the context

Answer 3

• witness should imagine the crime scene and the context in their mind
• include things like weather , sight and smell
• how they were feeling at the time

Question 4

reverse the order

Answer 4

• events should be recalled in a different chronological order to original sequence
• prevent people reporting their expectations of the event rather than what happened
• to prevent dishonesty as it is harder to make up something when recalling in reverse order

Question 5

change perspective

Answer 5

• recall the incident from other people’s perspectives
• to stop the effect of schemas on recall
• schema may generate expectation & they may recall these rather than what happened

Question 6

the enhanced cognitive interview (ECI)

Answer 6

• Fisher et al = developed some additional elements of the cognitive interview to focus on the social dynamics and the environment

Question 7

what does the ECI include?

Answer 7

• When to use eye contact
• Reducing eyewitness anxiety
• Asking the witness to speak slowly
• Minimising distractions, e.g. putting a ‘do not enter’ sign on the door, turning phones off, no posters on the walls.
• Ask open-ended questions (not closed questions that only get a one-word answer).

Question 8

evaluation of improving EWT: CI is time consuming (weakness)

Answer 8

• more time consuming and the police may be reluctant to use it due to time and staffing restraints.
• police officer need to be trained on how to it carry out and some forces have limited amount of training
  -It is likely that the proper version of the cognitive interview has not been used and hasn’t produced results that have impressed people

Question 9

evaluation of improving EWT: some elements may be more valuable than other (weakness)

Answer 9

• Milne & Bull (2002) = found that each individual element was equally valuable
  
  • found that using the combination of ‘report everything’ and ‘context reinstatement’ produced the best recall
• confirms that some aspects are more useful than others
• casts doubt on the credibility of the overall interview

Question 10

evaluation of improving EWT: support for the effectiveness of the CI (strength)

Answer 10

• Kohnken et al (1999) = in a meta-analysis combined data from 55 studies comparing the CI with the standard interview. - CI consistently provided more accurate recall than the standard interview ( 41% increase in accurate information)
• shows that it is a benefit if the police use the CI

Question 11

evaluation of improving EWT: Ci creates more inaccurate recall (weakness)

Answer 11

• may also increase the amount of incorrect information recalled
• Kohnken et al (1999) = ECI particularly produced more inaccurate information than the CI
• CI may sacrifice quality of EWT over quantity
• meaning that the the police should treat evidence gained from the CI and the ECI with caution.

Question 12

evaluation of improving EWT: variations of the CI are used (strength/weakness)

Answer 12

• different police forces use different variations of the CI
• can be a problem when trying to evaluate the effectiveness of the CI as we don’t know exactly how it has been implemented
• good as they are using it in a way that suits them