POZZULO Flashcards
BACKGROUND
Children and adults produce similar correct identification rates from line-ups when the target is present (target-present line-ups), but even 13-year-olds struggle to correctly reject target-absent line-ups, leading to higher rates of false positive responses than with adults.
These errors may be due to social factors, such as social pressure, rather than cognitive factors, such as bad memory.
The desire to please the interviewer, who is often an authority figure, may also be a social factor that leads to higher false positive responses in children
PSYCH BEING INVESTIGATED
AIM
To investigate whether children:
are less able to recognise human faces than adults
make more false positive identifications than adults when faced with:
– target-absent line-ups versus target-present line-ups
– human faces and cartoon characters
SAMPLE
Sample. 59 children and 53 adults. 4-7 yr olds from 3 schools, 17-30 yr olds psychology course Sampling Technique: not stated
PROCEDURE
Research Method: Lab Experiment with mixed design:
Design: Two groups compared: children and adults: Repeated measures: all did line-ups
IV: Age-Children or adults; type of target face (cartoon/adult), type of lineup- target present/abs
DV:Correct ID on target present line-up; correct rejection rate on target absent line-up
Trials: Watched a video of cartoon or adult (male/female) for 6 sec; then competed line up
Controls: The four videos and the order of the faces in the line-ups were randomised for each participant to prevent order effects. Standardised instructions were given to each participant prior to presentation of the photo line-ups. All experimenters wore the same type of
‘professional-casual’ clothing
RESULTS
Target-present line-ups:Children and adults were significantly better at identifying familiar cartoon characters than human faces. Children performed much worse than adults when identifying human faces. Familiar (cartoon) Children 0.99 Adults 0.95 Unfamiliar (human) Children 0.23 Adults 0.66
Target-absent line-ups-Children had a significantly higher correct rejection rate when cartoon characters were used (0.74) compared with human faces (0.45).
Adults also performed significantly better with cartoon characters (0.94) compared to human faces (0.70). Children’s rate of false positive responses was much higher than adults.
CONCLUSION
As children were able to correctly identify cartoon characters in target-present line-ups, cognitive factors were not responsible for the lower success rate in target-absent line-ups.
Errors were caused by social factors – that is, incorrectly believing that the researcher wanted them to make a positive identification, no matter whether the child thought it was right or wrong.
Children are less accurate when faced with human actors and more likely to give false positive responses than adults.
GRAVE
:)Validity – using repeated measures meant results were not affected by participant variables, such as having better/worse working memory skills.:)Objectivity – the data obtained was quantitative. The participants were either right or wrong in their answers on the line-up task. Therefore, there was no room for interpretation/researcher bias.:(Reliability – although standardised instructions and procedure were used, the questions during the filler task were not exactly the same for everyone. This may have affected the participant on the line-up task, thus lowering reliability.:(Generalisations – the findings may not be generalisable to participants from lower socioeconomic backgrounds as the children were all from private
Strengths:
Laboratory experiment:Standardised environment, such that the experience of the adults and children was as identical as possible. The dependent variable, of choice of individual in the line-up was a clearly operationalised measure of line up accuracy
Repeated measures meant results were not affected by participant variables, such as having better/worse memory skills, thus increasing validity. Data obtained was quantitative- the participants were either right (correctly identified Dora/Diego/Human, or correctly said they were not present in the line up) or they were wrong (false positive, false negative). There was no room for researcher bias/interpretation, therefore the data was more subjective.
Additionally the quantitative data could be used to statistically analyse and therefore compare the two conditions (differences caused by the IV’s of age and target type (human and cartoon).
Weaknesses:
Reliability: Although standardised instructions and procedure were used, the questions during the filler task were not exactly the same for everyone- this may have affected the participant on the line-up task, thus lowering reliability.
Additionally the use of a laboratory as a line-up location lacked mundane realism and ecological validity. The emotional experience for both children and adults would be very different from being faced with an actual line-up in a police station etc.
Generalisations: the findings may not be generalisable to participants from lower socioeconomic backgrounds, as the children were from 3 private schools. The adults were all from a university, suggesting higher than average intelligence.
APP TO EVERYDAY LIFE
eyewitness testimonies can be affected by the expectation of others, especially with child witnesses. The findings could be used to develop police guidelines for interviewing child witnesses, reducing the social factors that reduce the accuracy of witness identifications by children
NATURE VS NURTURE
INDIVIDUAL VS SITUATIONAL
When a target is present in a line-up of cartoon characters, adults and children are as accurate as each other. However, this is not the case for human faces. Individual characteristics such as age or memory may not be as important as situational characteristics such as familiarity. The findings of the study suggest that situational factors such as social pressure (i.e. the perceived expectations of others) may explain why children are more likely to identify a suspect even in a target-absent line-up.
USE OF CHILDREN IN RESEARCH
Young children are vulnerable to social pressure, so they were protected from harm by: seeking parental consent as children cannot understand the risks of participation » telling them that they could change their mind and not get into trouble
»conducting craft activities to put them at ease before the experiment started
ETHICS
