The cognitive interview

• the CI is a technique used by the police in order to receive details from eyewitnesses after an event, it is more complex than the standard police interview and has 4 main steps witnesses work through whilst they are encouraged to speak slowly and take their time.
• report everything, reinstate the context, reverse the order, change the perspective
• evaluation points- kohnken conducted a meta analysis and found the CI was superior to the standard police interview in the amount of correct info reported from witnesses. therefore the CI is effective at improving the accuracy of EWT.
• practical issues- time consuming to carry out, not many police officers have received the proper training to conduct it. meaning it may sometimes be carried out incorrectly and may not lead to any improvement in EWT.
• However, Kohnken also found the CI generated more incorrect info than the standard police interview, therefore may be better at gaining more deets, but not as good as distinguishing between correct and incorrect deets, the CI therefore may at times reduce the accuracy of EWT
• developed in 1985 by fisher and geiselman, fisher studied the techniques used by the police in Florida when interviewing witnesses. the following factors were identified as needing improvement and called the standard interview.
• the original not as good standard interview as discovered by fisher and geiselman- witnesses given large number of quick direct and closed questions in a short time, order of questions were not asked in a way that matched witnesses mental representation, witnesses were not able to talk freely about their experience and were frequently interrupted.
• first feature of CI- cognitive reinstatement- witness is asked to mentally return to crime scene including physical environment and emotional state. Based on cue dependant forgetting (context/state)
• after CR- pp is asked to report everything- all details even if they seem irrelevant
• after CR and RE- the pp is asked to attempt recall from a changed perspective - to consider and mentally recreate how the crime would be recalled from perspective of other witnesses/perpetrator, 'holistic' view of event to minimise bias and disrupt schema.
• finally, as the last stage, after CR, RE and CP, the pp is asked to recall in reverse order (RO) eg different chronology/timelines, end to beginning, or middle to start, this challenges our expectations/schema
• there is an enhanced version of the CI- focus on building rapport and making the interviewee comfortable,
• EVALUATION- meta analysis of 42 studies involving over 2500 interviews from Kohnken et al (1999) found a significant increase in the amount of information recalled. However there was also a significant increase in the amount of incorrect information recalled, resulting in a very similar accuracy rate between the SI and CI, this may counter the crediblity of the CI and it may be limited of practical use due to increased errors
• CI may be time consuming- requiring more time than officers may have available, especially when conducting a time sensitive case, also, the CI requires significant training and investment, diverting officers from their daily duties. These issues mean the CI may not be adopted due to the limited financial resources available to police forces.
• Evaluation positive- a cost benefit analysis- would consider the effect on the overall justice system and economy of the CI. it may be worth the additional recources invested in training to make a more effective police force, with the CI ultimately reducing crime and its cost to wider society.
• drawback of the CI- not useful in improving the identification of suspects from identity parades and from photos, this means the CI has limited usefulness in a number of common police activities involving EWT.
• stages- reinstating the context, change the order of events to reverse, reporting everything, and changing perspective