key question - how reliable is EWT? Flashcards
weapon focus A01? - description?
as a weapon is usually unusual in most societies it tends to attract someones attention and distracting them from other significant details of the criminal for example. this is due to the weapon taking up capacity in the individuals memory causing them to not retain other information.
what did Taylor find? WF
when individuals pay attention to a weapon at the scene of a crime it leaves no available room to pay attention to other things.
what did loftus et al find? (1987) WF
they found that when showing participants slides of a customer holding either a gun or a chequebook depending on the condition, the participants who viewed the slides of the gun were less likely to identify the customer in an ID parade compared to chequebook condition. (35%)
what did pickle find (1998) WF
they did a study of a man walking into a hair salon and depending on the condition he was holding a different item. control = nothing, scissors (high threat, not unusual), raw chicken (low threat, unusual), wallet (low threat, not unusual) and a handgun (high threat, unusual)
participants remembered the least about that man when he was holding raw chicken or a handgun.
what does pickles study regarding weapon focus show?
that it is the unusual presence of an object rather than the threat.
what is post even information? (A01) - description?
post-event information is the information that an EW is exposed to after seeing the crime. this information can impact what a participant thinks they saw as we know that we can confabulate information in order to make sense of what we saw. this impacts the accuracy and reliability of EWT.
what is another factor of post-event info?
leading questions - which are questions that may be asked during interviews by police to an EWT - It usually involves misinformation being given and impacting the accuracy of what a participant knew they saw.
what did Yuille and Cutshaw find?
they found that when looking at a real case in Canada of a man trying to rob a gun store and being shot by the owner. They looked at the initial interview of EW in comparison to the interview that took place 4-5 months later and witnesses were not impacted by leading questions - their testimony was still detailed and accurate.
loftus and Palmer? leading questions?
participants speed estimation on how fast a car was going depending on the verb used to describe the crash.
how does stress and arousal play a role in effecting EWT?
researchers suggest that overwhelming levels of stress can lead our performance in certain tasks to decline, such as remembering information. this is known as Yerkes-Dodson Law (1908). - going over the optimum level of stress and arousal and ignoring important things around you.
what did valentine and mesout find?
conducted a study in the London dungeon and got a man “scary person” to block the paths of each participant. they were then asked to fill out a questionnaire to rate their levels of anxiety and then identify the man from a photo-line up. they found that those with lower anxiety levels were better at identifying the “scary person”.
what did Maass and Kohnken (1989) find?
students were approached by a women holder a syringe or a pen and she said or did not say she would give them an injection. - those in the pen condition were better at identifying the women. and those who were scared on injections showed much less recall.
effects of gender on EWT?
Shapiro and Penrod (1986) - found that women were better at face recognition than males.
description: what does eyewitness testimony refer to?
the recalled memory of a witness to a crime or inciden. this is recorded in a police statement or given as verbal testimony to be used as evidence in a court of law.
why is EWT so important?
because sometimes juros may be more likely to rely of witness testimony than scientific proof and so the outcome may of many criminal trials hinges upon the accounts of crimes provided by witnesses.
