Pozzulo (issues and debates)

Question 1

Nature

Answer 1

The characteristics we are born with or develop out of the natural maturation process

Question 2

Nature explanations

Answer 2

• Younger children may have less developed cognitive abilities (poorer memory recall/ poor attention/ suscetibility to suggession).
• Thus there may be innate biological factors that contribute to false positive responses in target absent line ups.

Question 3

Nurture

Answer 3

The characteristics we develop as a result of learning

Question 4

Nurture explanations

Answer 4

• Suceptibility to making false positive decisions in line ups may be due to social factors.
• Like being socialised to awnser questions issued by adults in higher authority. Thus they may feel social pressure to select someone even when uncertain in a line up.

Question 5

Situational

Answer 5

• The poor performance of child witnesses in target absent line ups was due to social demands, such as feeling pressured.

Question 6

Individual

Answer 6

• Characteristics of the child witnesses themselves, such as their age, cognitive development, memory abilities, suggestibility, or prior experiences
• Plays a crucial role in determining their likelihood of making false positive identifications.

Question 7

Evaluate the ethics of this experiment

Answer 7

• INFORMED CONSENT: Parents filled a written consent form
• PROTECTION FROM HARM:The experimenters did some craft activities with the children before the experiment to help them feel comfortable. Ongoing monitoring of the childrens stress, fatigue and anxiety.
• DECEPTION: They briefed the children, telling them that they were researchers from a university doing a project on TV shows and computer game
• RIGHT TO WITHDRAW: It was made clear to the children that they could change their minds about wanting to join in and they would not get into trouble

Question 8

Practical issues with using children

Answer 8

• The researchers recorded the open filler questions.
• The use of pointing to record responses.
• Defriefed in a child-friendly way

These practical changes help make the task accessible and respond easily

Question 9

Real world application

Answer 9

• Strategies should be implemented to reduce social demand that could influence a child’s response to a line up like potential improvements in the way children are interogated (improve the relaibility of their testimonies)
• Suggests children would not be reliable witnesses as adults in everyday life as children are more likely to make false postives when the target is absent.