Memory- EWT

Question 1

What is EWT?

Answer 1

The ability of people to remember the details of events such as accidents and crimes which they have witnessed

Question 2

Which factors affect the accuracy of EWT?

Answer 2

-Leading questions
-Misleading information
-Post-event discussion
-Anxiety

Question 3

What is EWT used for?

Answer 3

-Recorded in a police statement
-Court proceeding- verbal testimony within court to provide evidence

Question 4

What is misleading information?

Answer 4

-Incorrect information is given to the eyewitness usually after the vent

Question 5

What forms does misleading information take?

Answer 5

-Leading questions
-Post-event discussion between co-witnesses or other people

Question 6

What is a leading question?

Answer 6

-A question which is phrased in a way that suggests a certain answer

Question 7

Who carried out a study into leading questions in 1974?

Answer 7

-Loftus and Palmer

Question 8

What was the aim of Loftus and Palmer’s study?

Answer 8

-To investigate the effect of leading questions on EWT

Question 9

What was the procedure for Loftus and Palmer’s study?

Answer 9

-Lab experiment
-Three groups of students were asked to watch a film about a car crash and were asked questions about what they had seen
-The first group were asked, “How fast were the cars going when they hit each other?”
-For the other group the words “smashed into each other” were used
-The control group were not asked about speed
-A week later they were interviewed and asked if they had seen any broken glass

Question 10

What were the findings of Loftus and Palmer’s study?

Answer 10

-The smashed group’s average speed estimate was 41 mph
-The hit group average speed estimate was 38 mph
-Although there was no broken glass at the scene 32% of the participants who heard the word smashed said there was compared to 14% of the hit group and 12% of the control group

Question 11

What was concluded from Loftus and Palmer’s study?

Answer 11

–The words all had very different connotations regarding the speed and force of the impact
-The word smashed tends to imply broken glass and it is feasible to expect broken glass at a car accident
-The participants unconsciously incorporated these into the memory of these events and it had affected judgement of speed and memory

Question 12

Why do leading questions affect EWT?

Answer 12

-Response bias explanation
-Substitution explanation

Question 13

What is the response bias explanation?

Answer 13

-The wording of the question doesn’t affect participants’ memories it influences how they decide to answer
-For example, smashed implied a higher speed

Question 14

What is substitution explanation?

Answer 14

-The wording of the question changes the memory of the film clip
-Smashed= broken glass

Question 15

Why are artificial materials a limitation? (leading questions)

Answer 15

P- Artificial materials
E-Participants watched film clips of accidents which is very different from witnessing a car crash in real life as it is much less traumatic and less anxiety-inducing
E- Yuille and Cutshall found that witnesses of a traumatic armed robbery had accurate recall after 4 months
L- This shows that using artificial tasks tells us little about how leading questions affect EWT of real accidents or crimes

Question 16

Why is real-life application a strength? (leading questions)

Answer 16

P-RLA
E-Practical uses for police officers and investigators are important because the consequences of inaccurate EWT can be serious
E-Loftus 1975- leading questions can have such a distorting influence on memory that police officers need to be careful about how they phrase questions in interviews
L- Can make an important difference in people’s lives (improving the legal system)

Question 17

How are individual differences in the accuracy of EWT a limitation? (leading questions)

Answer 17

P-Individual differences in accuracy of EWT
E-Anastasia and Rhodes (2006) found that older people were less accurate than younger people
E-Howveer all age groups were more accurate in identifying people from their age group (age group bias)
Often young people

Question 18

How are demand characteristics a limitation? (leading questions)

Answer 18

P-Lab studies of EWT suffer from demand characteristics
E-research participants usually want to be helpful + attentive and if they do know the answer then they guess
E-“ Did you see a blue car”- may reply yes as they think it is more helpful
L-Challenges the validity of EWT research, studies tend to measure the accuracy of eyewitness memory but the answers eyewitnesses give may not reflect their memory

Question 19

Define post-event discussion

Answer 19

When there is more than one witness to an event, they may discuss what they have seen with their witnesses or with other people

Question 20

What is meant by EWT becoming contaminated?

Answer 20

-When the witnesses discuss the observed crime
-They combine (mis)information

Question 21

When did Gabbert carry out her study?

Answer 21

-2003

Question 22

What was the aim of Gabbert’s experiment?

Answer 22

To investigate the effect of post-event discussion on the accuracy of EWT

Question 23

What was the procedure of Gabbert’s experiment?

Answer 23

-Participants were studied in pairs
-Each participant watched a video of the same crime from a different
-Each participant could see elements the other could
-Both participants then discussed what they had seen before taking a recall test on their own

Question 24

What were the findings of the gabberts experiment?

Answer 24

-71% of the participants mistakenly recalled aspects of the events they did not see but had picked up in PED
-In the control group there was no discussion and there was no information incorrectly recalled

Question 25

What did Gabbert conclude?

Answer 25

-Participants often confer with each other
-This may be to gain approval or because they believe the other witnesses are right (memory

Question 26

What is the limitation of Gabert’s research? (ecological validity)

Answer 26

-Lacks ecological validity
-The witness saw different perspectives of the same crime, this would be the same in a real crime
-However, the witnesses knew they were taking part in an experiment and were more likely to pay attention to details
-Does not reflect a real crime

Question 27

Give a strength of Gabert’s research: (population validity)

Answer 27

-Good population validity
-They tested 2 different populations a group of young adults (uni students) and older adults and the results were very similar
-A non-biased sample helped them to conclude that post-event discussion affects adults in a similar way
-However, they did not test this on children

Question 28

Give a limitation of Gabert’s research (accuracy of EWT)

Answer 28

-Accuracy of EWT- does not explain why memories are distorted
-It could be due to poor memory and not being able to distinguish what they have seen/heard
-It could also be due to wanting to conform to their co-witness/ social pressure
-So further research is required

Question 29

Give a stregth of gaberts Rsearche (Relaisble)

Answer 29

-Highly reliable as it is a standardised procedure
-They use the same video and ask the same critical question
-They all watched the video of the girl stealing and were asked the same question
-Therefore, extraneous variables are reduced

Question 30

What is anxiety?

Answer 30

-A state of physical and emotional arousal
-Includes emotions such as worried thoughts and feelings of tension

Question 31

What do the physical changes of anxiety include?

Answer 31

-Increased heart rate and swaetiness

Question 32

What does anxiety affect?

Answer 32

-Anxiety is a normal reaction to stressful situations
-It can affect the accuracy and detail of EWT

Question 33

Anxiety causes significant emotional and physical effects but how does this impact EWT?

Answer 33

-Not clear whether it improves or worsens EWT
-Research evidence for both sides

Question 34

Anxiety causes physical arousal in the body what effect does this have on recall?

Answer 34

-Prevents us from paying attention
-Which makes us miss vital cues

Question 35

What was the study conducted in 1976?

Answer 35

-Johnson and Scott

Question 36

What was the aim of Johnson and Scott’s experiment?

Answer 36

To investigate the effect on weapons on the accuracy of EWT

Question 37

What was the procedure of Johnson and Scott’s experiment?

Answer 37

-Participants were told they would be taking part in a lab study
-While sat in the waiting room they could hear an argument in the next room
-In the low anxiety condition a man walks through holding a pen with grease on his hands
-In the high anxiety condition the man walks through with a knife covered in blood

Question 38

What were the findings of J+S?

Answer 38

-Participants had to identify the man they had seen out of 50 photos
-In the low anxiety condition 49% identified him correctly
-In the high anxiety condition 33% identified him correctly

Question 39

What was the conclusion of J+S?

Answer 39

The more anxious you are the less accurate your recall is

Question 40

What is the tunnel theory of memory?

Answer 40

A witness narrows their attention to the weapon as it is the source of anxiety

Question 41

What is the positive effect of anxiety?

Answer 41

-The flight or fight response is trigered
-This increases alertness to cues
-Improving memory

Question 42

Who carried out a study in 1986?

Answer 42

-Yuile and Cutshall

Question 43

What was the aim of the Y+C study?

Answer 43

To investigate the effects of anxiety on EWT

Question 44

What was the procedure of Y+C study?

Answer 44

-Interviewed eyewitness of a real-life shooting in a gun shop in Vancouver Canada
-out of the 21 witnesses 13 agreed to take part
-They were interviewed 4-5 months after the incident and these were compared to the original police interviews on the day of the shooting
-The more details were given, the better the accuracy
-They were asked to rate their stress levels at the time of the incident on a 7-point scale
-They were also asked if they had emotional problems since the incident

Question 45

What were the results of the y+C study?

Answer 45

-Witnesses were very accurate in the original interviews
-They were still accurate 5 months later
-The participants with the highest stress levels (88%) had the most accurate recall compared to the least stressed 75%)

Question 46

What was the conclusion of J+C?

Answer 46

-Highest anxiety levels produce the most accurate recall

Question 47

What is the Yerkes and Dodson effect?

Answer 47

-Inverted U shape curve
-Optimum anxiety levels are beneficial

Question 48

Give a limitation of EWT (lacks ecological validity)

Answer 48

-Lackisecological validity
-Participants were waiting in the reception area outside the laboratory, they may have anticipated that something was going to happen
-Could have affected the accuracy of their judgements. -Results from real-life case studies (see above) refute the findings of Loftus and suggest that her results do not represent real-life cases of extreme anxiety

Question 49

Give a limitation of EWT (broken ethical guidelines)

Answer 49

-Ethical guidelines were broken.
-The participants were deceived about the nature of the experiment and not protected from harm. Loftus (John and Scott) exposed some of the participants to a man holding a bloodied knife, which could have caused extreme feelings of anxiety.
-This is an issue as these participants may have left the experiment feeling exceptionally stressed and anxious, especially if they, or someone they knew, had been involved in knife crime.

Question 50

Give a limitation of EWT (weapon focus and anxiety)

Answer 50

-Weapon focus comes from Pickel who who proposed it could be due to suprise and not anxiety
-She arranged for particpants to watch a theif enter a hairdressing salon with a pair of scissors (high risk, low suprise) / handgun/walletand a whole raw chicken (low threat, hiugh suprise)
-Identification least accurate with high suprise rather than high threat

Question 51

Stregth of j+C (lab studys)

Answer 51

-Lab studys
-relaible