factors affecting accuracy of ewt - misleading info

• Research on leading questions

  • when asked a question the wording may lead you to a certain answer , this happens in eye witness testimony's. The police may direct a witness to a particular answer for example Loftus and Palmer found certain words to describe a car accident led to the participants estimating different speeds.
• Loftus and Palmers procedure

  • They arranged 45 participants to watch film clips of car accidents and they asked them questions about the accident. One of these questions was a leading question ( also called misleading information)- participants were asked to describe how fast cars were travelling " about how fast were the cars going when they hit each other?".
  • There were 5 groups and each was given a different verb in the leading question - either hit, contacted, bumped, collided and smashed.
• Findings to Lotus and Palmers procedure

  The mean speed for each group was calculated. Contacted resulted in a mean speed of 31.8mph and smashed has the mean 40.5. This leading question biased the ew recall.
• Why do leading questions affect EWT?

  • The response bias explanation suggests the wording of the question has no real affect on the participants memories but influences how they answer. When the participants is given the word smashed it encourages them to choose a higher speed estimate.
  • Loftus and Palmer conducted a second experiment that supported the substitution explanation, whyc suggests ghe wording of the question alters the participants memory of the film clip. This is shown because the participants given the verb smashed were most likely to report seeing glass that wasn't there compared to these who got the verb hit. The critical verb altered there memory.
• Research on post event discussion

  • eyewitnesses to a crime may discuss their memories together this is called post even discussion.
  • Gabbert et Al studied participants in pairs - each participant watched a video of the same crime but filmed from different views. So each could see elements of the event that the other couldn't. E.g only one could see the title of a book bring carried by a woman. Both participants they discussed what they had seen before separately completing a test.
• Findings on research for post event discussion

  • researchers found 71% of the participants mistakenly recalled aspects of the event they did not see in the video but picked up in discussion. Compared to the control group with no discussion which was at 0%. This supports memory conformity
• why do post event discussions affect ewt

  • one exp is memory contamination. When witnessed discuss aspects of a crime there testimonies may become altered or distorted. This is because they combine information with their own memories.
  • Another exp is memory conformity - Gabert et Al concluded witnesses often go along with each other either for social approval or because they believe the other person is right. Unlike memory contamination the actual memory is unchanged.
• Eval 1 - real world application

  Strength is that research into misleading info has practical use in the criminal justice system. Inaccurate ewt have serious consequences. Lotus believes leading questions can distort memory and so police need to be careful of hoe they phrase questions when interviewing ew. Psychologists have sometimes acted as expert witnesses in court trials to explain the limits of ewt to juries.

  This shows psychologists can improve the legal system.
• Eval 2- cp to 1

  • However, practical applications of ewt may be affected by issues with the research. E.g Loftus and Palmers participants watched films in a lab. This is completely different to ewt in the real world. Foster et Al points out what ew have to remember in real life have much more serious consequences than in a lab, so the participants may be less motivated to be accurate.
  • This suggests research such as Loftus and Palmer are too pessimistic about the effects of misleading info.
• Eval 3 - evidence against substitution

  limit of the substitution theory is that wet are more accurate for some aspects than others. E,g Sutherland and Hayne showed participants a video clip. When participants were asked misleading questions, their recall was more accurate for central details than peripheral ones.

  Its assumed the participants attention was on central details of the event and so these memories were resistant to misleading info. This suggests central details are not distorted a outcome not predicted by the substitution exp.
• Eval 4 - evidence against memory conformity

  • limit is that there's evidence that post event discussion can actually alter ewt. Skagerberg and Wright showed their participants film clips. There were two versions e.g in one video the muggers hair was dark brown and light in the other. The participants discussed the clips in pairs , each seeing different versions. They often didn't report what they had seen or what tgdr had heard but a blend of the two. E.g the muggers hair was medium brown. This suggests the memory us distorted through memory contamination by post event discussion not the result of memory conformity.
• Eval 5 - demand characteristics

  • lab studies have been used to identify misleading info as a cause of inaccurate ewt. However, Zaragoza and McCloskey argue many answers given by participants in lab studies are due to demand characteristics. Participants usually want to help the researcher so they may guess when they are asked a question they don't know the answer too.