PSYC325

Question 1

What are the 3 parts of memory involved in eyewitness testimony? Describe their functions.

Answer 1

1. Encoding: how memories enter the brain.
2. Storage: memories are stored within the brain.
3. Retrieval: getting the memory out of the brain to use later.

Question 2

What does our perception of experiences depend on?

Answer 2

Past experience, stereotypes, expectations, beliefs, and knowledge.

Question 3

What are schemas?

Answer 3

Beliefs and expectations we have concerning the nature, behaviours, or functions of objects, people, and events.

Question 4

How are schemas affected regarding our own self-concept or professional functioning? Give an example of this.

Answer 4

Individuals can apply the schemas regarding their own selves or their profession to situations where it is not appropriate. Example: a police officer is more likely to see a congregation of people as a drug deal.

Question 5

How are schemas affected regarding our own self-concept or professional functioning? Give an example of this.

Answer 5

Individuals can apply the schemas regarding their own selves or their profession to situations where it is not appropriate. Example: a police officer is more likely to see a congregation of people as a drug deal.

Question 6

How are schemas impacted by temporary influences? Give an example.

Answer 6

Individuals are likely to be influenced by temporary influences where the schemas for these situations are activated during inappropriate scenarios. Example: when a dental student is learning to remove teeth, they are more likely to see teeth in their surrounding environments.

Question 7

How can schemas be activated by others? Give an example.

Answer 7

Their language/statements. Example: if an individual yells to stop a thief, people are likely to have their schema activated regarding crime and preventing crime.

Question 8

What can happen when schemas have just been activated and how does it affect new information? Give an example.

Answer 8

Schemas that have been recently activated can remain active during the processing of new information. Example: after being a juror on a child abuse case, jurors are more likely to pay close attention to the relationships between adults and children.

Question 9

What did Fraser (2011) study regarding the potential for errors in schemas using the David Bain trial?

Answer 9

Showed participants a section of the David Bain 111 call, each time giving different groups different information on the case. One group was told David was the killer, the other was told his father was the killer. Those who were told David was the killer were more likely to hear David confessing in the call, whereas those who were told the father was the killer were more likely to hear David confessing to his father shooting his family.

Question 10

What did Payne (2001) do to study the potential for errors in schemas and what were the results?

Answer 10

Shown either a black or white face, then asked to classify objects as tools or weapons. When shown a black face they were quicker to categorise weapons, and more likely to mistakenly identify tools as weapons.

Question 11

What did Correll et al. (2002) discover regarding potential for errors in schemas and the shooting task?

Answer 11

Individuals were more likely to shoot an unarmed black person than an unarmed white person.

Question 12

What factors can influence memories being encoded?

Answer 12

Attention, salience, stress/arousal, presence of a weapon.

Question 13

What is change blindness?

Answer 13

People miss large changes in their environment from one view to the next.

Question 14

What did Leippe, Wells, & Ostrom (1978) discover regarding the effect of salience on memory? What part of the memory system has failed here?

Answer 14

When a theft was staged of an inexpensive or expensive item, individuals were much better at identifying the thief when the object was expensive. Even after the theft when they were told the low end object was of high value, subjects were not able to recall the robber. This shows it is a lack of encoding the memory.

Question 15

What is the Yerkes Dodson Law?

Answer 15

The idea there is an optimum level of stress/physiological arousal for peak performance. Too much or too little stress will decrease performance. The right amount will cause optimal performance.

Question 16

What did Loftus & Burns (1982) discover regarding levels of stress and remembering a bank robbery?

Answer 16

When participants were shown a violent ending to the video of the robbery, they had poorer memories of the details from just before the robbery, rather than being shown a non-violent ending where they remembered the details better.

Question 17

What does stress do to memory consolidation?

Answer 17

Stress may disrupt memory consolidation so the memories do not set into storage.

Question 18

What did Wessel & Merkelbach (1997) discover about stress and peripheral memory?

Answer 18

When individuals where phobic to spiders and were shown a spider in a jar, they were less likely to recall the peripheral details from the event (music, colour of the chair etc).

Question 18

What did Wessel & Merkelbach (1997) discover about stress and peripheral memory?

Answer 18

When individuals where phobic to spiders and were shown a spider in a jar, they were less likely to recall the peripheral details from the event (music, colour of the chair etc).

Question 19

What is the cue utilization theory?

Answer 19

People can only attend to a limited number of cues at any one time. As stress increases, their attention narrows to the stress-generating features. W

Question 19

What is the cue utilization theory?

Answer 19

People can only attend to a limited number of cues at any one time. As stress increases, their attention narrows to the stress-generating features.

Question 20

What did Morgan et al. (2004) discover regarding the stress levels of captured soldiers and their ability to identify?

Answer 20

When under high stress, soldiers were less able to identify someone correctly than when in low stress.

Question 21

What is the weapon focus effect?

Answer 21

When a weapon is present during a crime individuals tend to focus in on the weapon rather than the identity of the perpetrator.

Question 22

What did Loftus, Loftus, & Messo (1987) discover about the weapon focus effect during their study? What does this mean about arousal/context for the effect?

Answer 22

Levels of identification were much lower when a weapon was present, participants made longer eye fixations on the weapon than the chequebook. This suggests that arousal is partly causing the weapon focus effect.

Question 23

What did Pickel (1999) discover about the weapon focus effect during his study of police and priests carrying weapons? What does this suggest about arousal/context involvement in the effect?

Answer 23

When the priest held a gun there was much lower rates of identification compared to the police officer. This shows that context also has an effect of the weapon focus effect.

Question 24

What four things impact the strength of a memory being encoded?

Answer 24

Amount of exposure: the longer we see something, the more likely we are to encode it.
Age: younger individuals are less likely to encode information.
Salience: the more important we think the information is, the more likely we are to remember it.
Knowledge: is we understand something, we are more likely to strongly encode information.

Question 25

Why is memory reconstructive?

Answer 25

Whenever a memory is brought to mind, the brain takes different parts of the memory from various areas of the brain and attempts to put it back together, but it can often be reconstructed the wrong way.

Question 26

What are the three reasons memory status between encoding and retrieval can be altered?

Answer 26

Passage of time, intervening knowledge/experience, and misinformation.

Question 27

What does the Hermann Ebbinhaus Curve show?

Answer 27

It shows that we lose a lot of information very quickly, and then the level of forgetting flattens.

Question 28

What was the Betty K study about intervening knowledge and what did it show?

Answer 28

Participants were told a story about Betty, and then later told she was either homosexual or heterosexual. Then asked to recall the original passage. People made more label-consistent errors as their original memory was intervened by the later knowledge.

Question 29

What is hindsight bias?

Answer 29

When knowledge of current events, emotions, or outcome biases judgements and memory of processes leading up to them.

Question 30

What is the issue with intervening knowledge and memory?

Answer 30

People can experience information or experiences that can later influence previous memories when they are recalled.

Question 31

What is the standard misinformation procedure?

Answer 31

Expose participants to some sort of event. Participants later misled with some form of misinformation about the original event. Then later interviewed to see if the misinformation has integrated into initial memory.

Question 32

What is the misinformation effect?

Answer 32

When misinformation that is shown to subjects after an event leaks into an original memory and becomes part of the original memory.

Question 33

How is the media a source of misinformation?

Answer 33

Media often makes reports on crimes before the facts are released and often speculates on what may have happened. They often try to talk to witnesses before they have been formally interviewed which can cause reconsolidation of memory.

Question 34

How do co-witness discussions cause sources of misinformation?

Answer 34

When witnesses discuss an event with each other they share information on what they both saw, individuals can pick up on information that others share and say that they saw it too when they didn’t.

Question 35

What are some possible advantages and disadvantages of co-witness discussions?

Answer 35

Advantages: can prompt forgotten details, reinforce memory, help to aid from trauma, create a more accurate overall picture.
Disadvantages: can contaminate independent recollection, make witnesses unsure in their testimony, lead to reports of ‘common things’.

Question 36

What is normative conformity?

Answer 36

When people go along with the rest of the group because they do not want to be the odd one out.

Question 37

What is informational conformity?

Answer 37

When people believe the others in the group must be right and so they go along with their opinion.

Question 38

When does conformity in groups rapidly decrease?

Answer 38

When answers do not have to be said out loud.

Question 39

What is the original paradigm?

Answer 39

When people are put in pairs and both shown slightly different versions of information. Then can discuss with each other, so they have the chance to discuss the videos they saw and the differences within them.

Question 40

What is the MORI technique?

Answer 40

People wear glasses looking at the same screen, but the glasses show them different videos. They are then left to discuss with each other.

Question 41

What is the confederate paradigm?

Answer 41

When a subject and an experimenter confederate are both put together to watch slightly different videos, and the confederate afterwards leads discussion about what each individual saw in the videos.

Question 42

What is the illusory truth effect?

Answer 42

When the simple act of repeating a statement increases one’s belief in its truth.

Question 43

What is audience tuning?

Answer 43

When, even subconsciously, individuals tune the story details they are telling based on the reaction they want from the audience (sadness, sympathy etc).

Question 44

When people are asked to recall a witnessed event, what do they tend to do?

Answer 44

Bias their descriptions to reflect their own goals.

Question 45

What are the 4 options about how misinformation works and why people report misinformation?

Answer 45

1. The person reports the misinformation but knows it is wrong.
2. Original memory gets overwritten.
3. Two memories are developed, but the original memory is less accessible.
4. There was no original event as it was not encoded.

Question 46

What did Toland discover about the misinformation effect when people were asked to bet on their answers?

Answer 46

People will bet on their answers that involve misinformation as they believe it is the truth.

Question 47

What did Zajac discover about the misinformation effect when information was coming from a drunk vs sober person?

Answer 47

If people’s original memories of an event clash, participants more likely to take on misinformation from sober person than drunk. If person cannot remember the original event, they are just as likely to take misinformation from a drunk than a sober person.

Question 48

What was discovered when people were given the choice of the original memory item or a novel item? What does this suggest about memory?

Answer 48

When given the choice between the original or a novel item, people were more likely to choose the original item. This suggests original memories are still there in memory but may not be as accessible as the misinformation.

Question 49

What did Assefi & Garry discover about the misinformation effect when people believe they are drunk vs sober?

Answer 49

When people think they are drunk, they are more susceptible to taking on the misinformation. Sober people were still susceptible, but not as much.