Memory - Eyewitness Testimony Flashcards
What can eyewitness testimony be affected by? What was the investigation into this?
Misleading information, e.g. leading questions.
Lotus and Palmer (1974) carried out two experiments:
1: Participants were shown a film of a multiple car crash, then asked a series of questions including ‘how fast do you think the cars were going when they hit?’ In different conditions, the word ‘hit’ was replaced with ‘smashed’, ‘collided’, ‘bumped’ or ‘contacted’.
Participants given the word ‘smashed’ estimated the highest speed; those given the word ‘contacted’ gave the lowest estimate.
2: A week later, the participants were asked ‘did you see any broken glass?’ Although there was no broken glass in the film, participants were more likely to say that they’d seen broken glass in the ‘smashed’ condition than any other.
