Memory: Cognitive Interview

Question 1

What is a cognitive interview ?

Answer 1

A method of interviewing eyewitnesses to help them retrieve more accurate memories. It uses four main techniques all based on well established psychological knowledge of human brain

Question 2

What is the difference between a standard interview and a cognitive interview ?

Answer 2

A standard interview might just ask witnesses to recall and event but a cognitive interview could ask them to recall much more than that for example environmental details such as what was the weather like as a part or reinstating context or emotional details

Question 3

What are the four main techniques used in a cognitive interview ?

Answer 3

Report everything, reinstate the context, reverse the order and change perspective

Question 4

Explain report everything

Answer 4

Witnesses are encouraged to include every single detail
Even if it might seem irrelevant
Or
If witness does not feel confident about it

Question 5

Why does reporting everything help

Answer 5

Seemingly trivial details may be important
May trigger other important memories
By providing cue

Question 6

Explain context reinstatement

Answer 6

Witnesses should return to the original crime scene in their mind
Imagine what the environment was like

Question 7

Why does context reinstatement help ?

Answer 7

Aims to overcome effects of context dependent forgetting

Question 8

Explain reverse the order

Answer 8

Events recall in different chronological order to original sequence
Eg
Final point to beginning

Question 9

Why does reversing the order help ?

Answer 9

Prevent people from reporting expectations of how event must of happened
Prevents dishonesty
Harder to produce untruthful account if they must reverse it

Question 10

Explain change perspective

Answer 10

Witnesses should recall incident from other peoples perspectives

Question 11

Why does change in perspective help ?

Answer 11

Disrupt the effect of expectations and schema on recall.
The schema you have for a particular setting
Generates expectations of what would’ve happened
Schema is recalled rather than what actually happened

Question 12

What is the enhanced cognitive interview

Answer 12

Fisher et al (1987) developed additional elements of CI to focus on social dynamics of the interaction. This became known as enhanced cognitive interview

Question 13

What is involved in enhanced cognitive interview

Answer 13

Interviewer knowing when to establish eye contact 
Reducing witness anxiety 
Minimising distractions 
Open ended questions 
Witness to speak slowly

Question 14

What is one strength of the enhanced interview ?

Answer 14

Research to support enhanced ci is effective

Kohnken et al (1999) combined data from 50 studies in meta analysis which showed that eci provided more information than standard interview

Shows real practical benefit to the police using eci
Such as
Greater chance of catching criminals

Question 15

What is a strength of the cognitive interview

Context dependent

Answer 15

Cognitive interview aims to reduce context dependent forgetting

Eg godden and baddeleys 1975 study showed that a change in context between learning and recalling can produce 40% lower recall

Cognitive interview as a result
Prevents this by reinstating the context so witnesses can return to original crime scene and pick up on as many cues as possible to results in less forgetting as possible

Question 16

What is a limitation of the ci (time consuming)

Answer 16

The ci takes more time + more training.

For example more time is needed to establish rapport with witnesses to allow them to relax when compared to standard interview.

In addition the ci requires special training of those who conduct it

However - many forces have provided only few hours towards special training

This suggests that the ci is difficult to conduct and due its time consuming nature, it may be conducted less efficiently by police forces

Question 17

What is another limitation of the ci ?

More valuable

Answer 17

Some elements of the cognitive interview are more valuable than others.
For example Milne and bull found that using a combination of report everything and context reinstatement produced better recall than other conditions.
This would therefore make people question the existence of other elements of ci to the point they may miss them out even though they provide important information aswell.

Question 18

What is another limitation of ci (inaccurate information)

Answer 18

Ci also creates an increase of inaccurate information.

For example kohnken et al (1999) meta analysis found an 81% increase of correct information but also a 61% increase of incorrect information when compared to a standard interview

This suggests that that a cognitive interview may not be effective as thought and they should not replace standard interviews entirely.

Question 19

What is another limitation of ci (variation)

Answer 19

Many variation of ci are used instead of just one
Eg
Studies on the effectiveness of ci techniques use slightly different techniques or use the eci. It has also been reported that police forces have their own methods too.
This therefore suggest that everyone will not be getting the same results using ci as they may not be using the ci in a way that is the most effective with best results.