Social Psych and the Law

Question 1

where do eyewitnesses go wrong?

Answer 1

• encoding (ie. acquisition)
• storage
• retrieval

Question 2

encoding

Answer 2

• Viewing conditions matter
• Weapon focus effect -> attention tends to gravitate towards the weapon
• • Correct identification study (Tollestrup): 73% (no weapon) vs. 31% (weapon)
• Speech -> can be influenced by schemas (ex. Demo -> Marry Chris Smith)

Question 3

storage

Answer 3

• Memories can be tweaked by retrieval, by leading questions, etc.
• Leading questions = “misinformation effect”
• • “Did you see THE broken headlight?” Vs. “Did you see A broken headlight?”
• Verbal overshadowing: when we try to describe faces verbally, our identification of the face is worse

Question 4

retrieval

Answer 4

“Best guess” problem: people want to be helpful, so if we’re asked to make a decision, we make our best guess (ex. Jason vs. Kanye -> Jason is best guess)

Question 5

jurors and eyewitness testimony

Answer 5

• We place a lot of weight on eyewitness testimony
• Loftus study: students read same info about robbery with physical evidence
• • No eyewitness: 18% convict
• • Single eyewitness: 72% convict
• • Single eyewitness with bad vision who wasn’t wearing glasses: 68% convict

Question 6

eyewitness testimony: perceived vs. actual accuracy

Answer 6

• Witness confidence: associated with greater perceived accuracy but not a strong indicator of actual accuracy
• Memory for minor contextual details: associated with increased perceived accuracy but decreased actual accuracy!

Question 7

what can be done?

Answer 7

• Educate jurors
• Train police interviewers (ex. To avoid leading questions)
• Improve line-up procedures

Question 8

improving line-up procedures

Answer 8

• Don’t always include suspect in the line-up
• Use similar distractors (ex. If suspect is a blond white guy, make sure that all distractors are blond white guys)
• Sequential vs. Simultaneous line-ups (to combat best-guess problem)
• Examine speed of response (may provide info about accuracy)

Question 9

Frenda et al. eyewitness misinformation study: what did they find?

Answer 9

• Eyewitness memory subject to the misinformation effect
• Misinformation effect can be reduced by using the cognitive interview for eyewitnesses (Temporal ordering of events, avoiding suggestive questioning, discourage witnesses from guessing, etc.)

Question 10

Frenda et al. eyewitness misinformation study: the misinformation effect

Answer 10

• when subjects see/hear misleading information and then inadvertently incorporate elements of it into their memory
• Young children, the elderly, and those with attention/memory issues more susceptible to this effect than others -> those with higher intelligence and working memory capacity are more immune