Weapon focus influencing EWT reliability Flashcards
Define “weapon focus”.
An eyewitness’s concentration on a weapon leading to the exclusion of other details of the crime
What 2 theories explain weapon focus?
Stress:
+ Weapon being present creates high levels of arousal
+ Hinders the witness’s ability to recall peripheral details of the crime
Tunnel theory (attention):
The focus of attention on an unusual weapon being present diminishes the witness’s capacity to encode other peripheries
What are the 2 supporting and 2 refuting arguments for weapon focus impacting EWT accuracy?
Supporting:
Loftus et al (1987)
Steblay’s meta-analysis
Refuting:
Yuille & Cutshall
Pickel et al
How does Loftus et al (1987) support weapon focus impacting EWT accuracy? (4 points)
Showed participants slides of a customer in a restaurant and tracked their eye movements
The two conditions were that the customer was holding either a gun or chequebook to the cashier who was seen handing over money
Found there were more eye fixations and fixations of longer durations when the item was a gun compared to when it was a chequebook - supports the notion that weapon focus impacts EWT
However, the use of slides to depict the crime lacks mundane realism - cannot be applied to weapon focus in real-life crimes
How does Steblay’s (1992) meta-analysis support weapon focus impacting EWT accuracy?
They found low accuracy of EWT with weapon presence where stress levels varied
How does Yuille and Cutshall challenge weapon focus impacting EWT accuracy? (4 points)
A shooting occurred outside a gun shop in Canada - a thief stole guns and money but was shot six times and died
The police interviewed witnesses, and 13 of them were re-interviewed 3-5 months later
Recall was found to be still accurate despite the incident involving a dangerous weapon
Weapon focus’s may not be applicable to every anxious/stressful event
How do Pickel et al (1998) challenge stress and weapon focus impacting EWT accuracy? (5 points)
Investigated whether weapon focus is due to the tunnel theory (unusualness of an object) or stress
Participants were shown footage of a man approaching a hairdressing receptionist and her handing him money
IV: the item that the man was holding in his hand (scissors, gun, wallet, raw chicken or nothing)
DV: Mean memory score reflecting the number of items accurately remembered about the receptionist and the suspect
Mean memory score was lower for the Raw Chicken condition than for the Scissors and Gun conditions
Suggests that weapon focus is more due to the narrowing of attention due to the presence of unusual objects than the stress induced by threatening objects
