Improving EWT- Cognitive interview

• What is a cognitive Interview

  Interviewing eyewitnesses to help them retrieve more accurate memories. Contains four main techniques.
• What is a cognitive Interview?

  Interviewing eyewitnesses to help them retrieve more accurate memories. Contains four main techniques.
• What are the Four main Techniques for Cognitive Interview?

  Report everything: every single thing, even trivial details

  Reinstate the context: Go back to place in their mind and report environment (prevents context dependent forgetting)

  Reverse order: Event in different chronical order

  Change perspective: recall from other people's perspectives
• What did Geiselman et al's study find out about CI?

  It produced more accurate, detailed memories than standard police interview. Suggests that its effective.
• What is Enhanced Cognitive Interview? (Fisher et al)

  An advanced method of questioning witnesses that overcomes problems caused by inappropriate sequencing of questions.
• What is a limitation of using cognitive interview? (AO3)

  • Time consuming in contrast to standard police interview
  • More time needed to establish rapport and allow witness to relax for optimum recall
  • Requires special training which is hard for forces to provide for, minimum hours (KEBBELL AND WAGSTAFF)
  • Therefore unlikely the proper version of CI is used, may explain the lack of effectivity in EWT
• What is a strength of the elements used in CI? (AO3)

  • Milne and Bull found each component is equally valuable
  • Each technique produced more information than standard police interview
  • Using a combination of report everything and context reinstatement produced best recall
  • Overall strength as CI is more effective and elements can be used to improve police interviewing in EWT and gather details to piece together crime
  • Whole CI process isn't required to be impactful, increases credibility to officers
• What meta analysis supports the effectiveness of the ECI?

  • Kohnken et al's meta analysis study
  • 50 studies
  • Found enhanced CI consistently provided more correct info than SPI
  • Strength as this indicates there a practical benefits if police use ECI than CI or SPI
  • Supports the idea that police have a greater chance of catching and charging criminals, beneficial to the safety of society
• What extra features does the ECI include?

  • Interviewer should not distract witness with interrupting questions
  • Witness controls flow of information
  • Asking open-ended questions
  • Witness speaks slowly
  • Participants reminded to not guess or use dont know to reduce confabulations
  • Reduction in anxiety in witnesses
• What is a confabulation?

  • A false memory
• Strength of CI via meta analysis support (AO3)

  • MEMON et al
  • 57 studies over 25 years
  • 32% used CI
  • FOUND CI produced more accurate detail than non-CI techniques (e.g. SPI)
  • Effect found was greater than Kohnken's meta analysis
  • Less evident with children but more evident with adults -> may lead to practical app in using MCI for children and CI for adults, helping catch prosecutors from accurate and detailed descriptions
  • May revolutionise departments that deal with EWT and be a more reliable options than SPI