anxiety affecting witness testimony

• Who are the two psychologists looking into anxiety affecting eyewitness testimonies?

  Johnson and Scott 1976
• what was johnson and scott’s procedure into anxiety affecting eyewitness testimonies?

  participants had to arrive at the lab and were told to wait outside the room ready for the study to begin
• what was the anxiety condition?

  participants overheard a heated conversation with glass breaking and furniture overturned a man was then seen with blood stained paper knife
• what was the non-anxiety condition?

  Part could overheard a discussion about equipment failure and a man leaving in a room with a pen in his hand
• participants were asked to identify the man who left the room from 50 photos
• what were the findings of this procedure?

  Anxiety condition was 33% creating accurate recognition and non-anxiety recognition was 49% creating accurate recognition
• Who were the two psychologist that proposed anxiety had a positive effect on recall?

  yuille and cutshall 1986
• what was the procedure of anxiety having a positive effect on recall?

  13 real life witnesses were interviewed of a a gun , there was an altercation between the theft and the shop owner
• what were the findings of anxiety having a positive effect on recall?

  Those most anxious remembered the most which was 88% versus 75%
• why are there such contradictory findings?

  The relationship between emotional arousal and performance looks like an inverted U
• what is the inverted U theory

  States performances will increase with stress but only to a certain point where it then decreases drastically
• what is a limitation of Johnson and Scott study?

  my test surprise not anxiety
• what is a limitation of field studies?

  They lack control of variables
• what is a strength of this procedure?

  The support for negative effects such as eyewitnesses accuracy was significantly poorer in the highly unusual conditions
• what is another strength of this procedure?

  There was also support for positive effects such as understressed the fight or flight response is triggered
• what is a limitation about the inverted U theory?

  It is too simplistic and difficult to define a measure because it has so many elements