improving the eyewitness testimony: cognitive interview

Question 1

what is the cognitive interview

Answer 1

Ronald Fisher and Edward Geiselman (1992) argued that eyewitness testimony could be improved if the police used better techniques when interviewing witnesses

They said that such techniques should be based on psychological insight into how memory
works and called these techniques collectively the COGNITIVE INTERVIEW (CI) to indicate its foundation in cognitive psychology

Question 2

what are the four main techniques of the cognitive interview

Answer 2

1. Report everything
2. Reinstate the context
3. Reverse the order
4. change perspective

Question 3

what is the benefits of report everything

Answer 3

Witnesses are encouraged to include every single detail of the event, even though it may seem irrelevant or the witness doesn’t feel confident about it

Seemingly trivial details may be important and, moreover, they may trigger important memories

Question 4

what is the benefits of reinstating the context

Answer 4

The witness should to return the original crime scene in their mind and imagine the environment (such as what the weather was like, what they could see)

and their emotions (such as what were their feelings). This is related to context - dependent forgetting as reinstating the physical and mental context may act as cues/ triggers

Question 5

what is the benefits of asking eyewitnesses to reverses the order of their account

Answer 5

events should be recalled in a different chronological order to the original sequence , e.g. from the final point back to the beginning, or from the middle to the beginning

This is done to prevent people reporting their expectations of how the event must have happened rather than actual events. It also prevents dishonestly (it’s harder for people to produce an untruthful account they have to reverse it)

Question 6

what are the benefits of changing perspectives

Answer 6

witnesses should recall the incident from people’s perspectives e.g. how it would have appeared to other witnesses or to the perpetrator

This is done to disrupt the effects of expectations and schema on recall.
The schema you have for a particular setting (such as going into a shop) generate exceptions of what would have happened and it is the schema that is recalled rather than what actually happen

Question 7

what is schema

Answer 7

schema is a framework of information that allows you to function in the world based on experiences

Question 8

what is the enhanced cognition interview (ECI)

Answer 8

Fisher et al (1987) developed some additional elements of the CI to focus on the social dynamics of the interaction

e.g. the interviewer needs to know when to establish eye contact when to relinquish it the enhanced CI also includes ideas such as reducing eyewitness anxiety, minimising distractions, getting the witness to speak slowly and asking open ended questions