misleading information

Created by

grace sawtell

Cards (13)

what is eyewitness testimony?
ability of people to remember details of events they have seen
what are the 2 parts that amount to misleading information?
leading questions
post-event discussion
outline leading questions
wording of a question alters a person's recall of an event
who studied the effect of leading questions?
Loftus and Palmer in 1974
explain Loftus & Palmer's study
showed participants a film of a car accident and then asked them questions
"how fast were the cars going when they hit each other"
when hit was changed to smashed = estimated speed of 40.5 mph
when hit was changed to contacted = estimated speed of 31.8 mph
what were the 2 explanations for the effect of leading questions?
response-bias explanation
substitution explanation
outline response-bias explanation
phrasing of a question suggested an answer
outline substitution explanation
question changes the witness's memory
what is post-event discussion?
after an event, witnesses discuss what they have seen, resulting in distortion of their own memory
who studied the effect of post-event discussion?
Gabbert et al in 2003
explain Gabbert et al's study about post-event discussions
participants watched different videos of the same event
condition 1 - discuss event before recall
condition 2 - didn't discuss event
71% mistakenly recalled when there was a discussion
0% mistakenly recalled when there was no discussion
define memory conformity
witnesses join memories together to win social approval or because they believe that the witnesses are right
evaluate misleading information
supporting research is from lab studies which lacks the emotional aspect of being a witness, experience lacks mundane realism

answers may be due to demand characteristics which deters from recalling a real-life event, reducing the validity

findings have real-world applications as can be used to amend questioning in police interviews, high ecological validity