Cognitive Interview

• Fisher+Geiselman (1984) claimed EWT could be improved if police use techniques based on psychological insights into how memory works.
• 1. Report everything


  • witnesses encouraged to recall every possible detail of event no matter how irrelevant it may seem, as even minor details can act as a cue to trigger other memories.
• 2. Reinstate the context

  • witness returns to crime scene (in mind or real life) and imagines the environment, e.g the weather, and their emotions.
  • based on concept of context-dependent forgetting
• 3. Reverse the order


  • events are recalled in a different order, e.g end to start
  • prevents witness's expectations of what happened interfering with the actual event
  • also prevents dishonesty as makes it harder to lie
• 4. Change perspective


  • witness recalls incident from other people's perspectives e.g a witness across the road
  • prevents influences of expectations and schemas on recall- mental framework of info developed through experience that help interpret incoming info
• ECI Fisher et al (1987)


  • focuses on social dynamics between interaction of witness+ interviewer e.g when to establish+ maintain eye contact
  • reducing EW's anxiety
  • minimising distractions
  • getting witness to speak slowly
  • asking open-ended questions
• strength- research support for effectiveness of CI (Kohnken et al)


  • Kohnken et al (1999) did a meta analysis combining data from 50 studies, comparing CI+ECI to standard police interviews
  • CI produced average of 41% more correct info than standard interview + only 4 studies showed no difference
  • shows CI effective in helping witnesses recall info + practical contributions to society
• limitation- conflicting evidence


  • however, Kohnken et al also found that CI led to an increase in incorrect info of around 20-30%
  • means that although witnesses recalled more info, some of it wasnt necessarily accurate- quantity over quality
  • questions reliability of CI+ECI
  • suggests that interviewers need to be cautious when using CI to gather details of an event
• limitation- time consuming


  • police are reluctant to use CI as it takes more time than the standard interview
  • requires special training which many forces dont always have the resources of funds to provide this for police offers
  • suggests CI is unrealistic to use in all incidents and may be more practical to use in special cases
• limitation- some elements of CI more useful than others (milne+bull)

  • Milne + Bull (2002) found that each individual technique of the CI alone produced more info than standard police interview
  • Also found that combining report everything stage with the reinstate context stage produced better recall than any other technique individually or combined
  • casts doubt on overall credibility of CI as reliability of effectiveness varies