Memory : Anxiety And EWT Flashcards
What is anxiety ?
A state of emotional and physical arousal. The emotions include having worried thoughts and feelings of tension. It is a normal reaction to stressful situations but can affect the accuracy and detail of EWT
What does Johnson and Scott’s study show about anxiety
Shows that anxiety has a negative effect on recall because high anxiety can lead to less good recall due to tunnel theory
What was the procedure of Johnson and Scott’s (1976) study ?
Participants believed they were going to take part in a lab study.
While seated, argument was heard in next room
In a low anxiety condition a man walked out carrying a pen with grease on his hands
In high anxiety condition, sound of breaking glass present
Man walked out holding paper knife covered with blood
Participants asked to identify man from 50 photos
What were the findings of Johnson and Scott’s (1976) research
49% of the participants who had seen man carrying a pen correctly identified him
33% of participants who had seen man carrying blood covered knife identified the man
What is the conclusion of Johnson and Scott’s (1976) study ?
Shows tunnel theory of memory which is the theory that witnesses attention narrows to focus on weapon because it is a source of anxiety decreasing accuracy of ewt
What did yuille and cutshall study show about the effect of anxiety on ewt
Anxiety has a positive effect on recall as high anxiety is associated with better recall because when witnessing a real crime, fight or flight system is triggered which increases our alert system
What was the procedure of yuille and cutshall (1986) study ?
A shop owner had shot a thief dead in Vancouver
21 witnesses , 13 agreed to take part
Interviewed 4-5 months after incident
Participants rated their stress on 7 point scale
Asked if they had emotional problems since event
Accuracy based on number of details reported
What were the findings of yuille and cutshall (1986) study?
Little change in accuracy after 5 months
Those who reported high levels o stress were most accurate (88% compared to 75% for less stressed )
What is the yerkes Dodson law (1908)
Lower levels of anxiety produce lower levels of recall accuracy but memory becomes more accurate as the level of anxiety increases. However there is a point where the optimal level of anxiety is reached and any more stress after this, recall will decline
What is limitation of research on the effects of anxiety on ewt (surprise rather than weapon)
A limitation of the effect anxiety has on ewt is that weapon focus relies on surprise not anxiety.
For example Pickel (1998) conducted experiment in which he used scissors, a handgun, a wallet or raw chicken as hand held items in a hairdressers video and found ewt accuracy was poorer in high unusualness condition
This shows that unusualness and surprise rather than anxiety/threat causes weapon focus which tells us nothing about how anxiety affects ewt
What is another limitation of research into the effects of anxiety on ewt (extraneous variables )
A limitation is research surrounding it uses eyewitnesses that have been interviewed sometime after event
In meantime
Researcher has no control over what happens
Post event discussion
Extraneous variables may now be responsible for the accuracy of ewt
Effects of anxiety impossible to assess
Internal validity reduced
What is another limitation of research on the effects of anxiety on ewt
Ethical issues
For example in Johnson and carls study participants were deceived and were not protected from when shown man holding blood covered knife
Argued
Unethical to potentially subject people to psychological harm by creating anxiety
This therefore does not contradict the findings but does questions the need for research on the effects of anxiety on ewt.
What is a limitation of yerkes and Dodson law ?
Too simplistic
Difficult to measure accurately because
Has cognitive , behavioural , emotional and physical elements
Inverted u assumes only physical arousal is linked to poor performance
Therefore
Incomplete explanation of how anxiety affects ewt
What is a strength of research into the effects of anxiety on ewt?
There are real life application of research
Understanding the effect of anxiety on the accuracy of EWT could help determine the credibility of a witness.
For example the yerkes and dodson law shows that there is an optimal level of anxiety that produces maximum accuracy
This helps people who are responsible for interviewing eye witnesses
