Leading Q's + Post-Event discussion Flashcards
Eyewitness testimony
the evidence supplied to a court by people who have seen a crime, based on their memory of the incident
leading questions
- questions that are phrased in such a way as to encourage the witness to give a certain answer
two explanations for leading questions
- response-bias explanation
- substitution-bias explanation
response-bias explanation - leading questions
argues that leading q’s don’t affect memory, merely the answer a person chooses to give
substitution-bias explanation - leading questions
argues that leading q’s distort memories because they contain MISLEADING INFO
procedure - study on leading questions
- Loftus and Palmer showed 45 american students a film of a car crash
- asked them to estimate the speed that cars were travelling when they crashed
findings - study on leading questions
parts in the ‘contacted’ condition:
- estimated speed = 31mph
parts in the smashed’ condition:
- estimated speed = 41mph
- week later parts were asked if they saw any broken glass (there wasn’t any)
‘contacted’ condition = 12%
‘smashed’ condition’ = 32%
= shows that leading q’s have a significant impact on what people recall + can change an entire memory of an event
ad of leading questions
- study is a lab experiment = highly controlled
- reduces chances of extraneous variables
= increasing validity of the study - this makes it easier for psychs to replicate their research to see if it is reliable (similar/ same results are found)
disads of leading questions
- ecological validity
- population validity
ecological validity - disads of leading q’s
- doesn’t have much ecological validity
- parts watched a VIDEO of a car crash
- people who witness a real car accident will have a stronger emotional connection to the event
= may not be as susceptible to leading q’s
population validity - disads of leading q’s
- study lacks population validity
- study consisted of 45 American students
- students are less experienced drivers
= maybe less competent at estimating speeds
= unable to generalise results of the study to other populations - older + more experienced drivers may be more accurate in their judgement of speeds
= less susceptible to leading questions
Post-Event Discussion
- the memory of an event can become contaminated through discussing events w/ others either due to:
= misinformation (memory contamination)
= desire for social approval can lead co-witnesses to reach a consensus view of what happened (memory conformity)
procedure - study on post-event discussion
- psych put parts in pairs
- got them to watch a different video of the same event = each got unique details
- in one condition, pairs were encouraged to discuss the event before individually recalling
- other condition, they didn’t discuss what they’d seen with each other
findings - study on post-event discussion
- 71% of witnesses who’d discussed the event went onto mistakenly recall the details that they couldn’t have seen themselves
- but learned during discussion w/ partner
ad of post-event discussion
- study has population validity
- two different populations, students + older adults were compared
= no significant difference between the two groups
= allows us to conclude that PED affects younger + older adults in a similar way