Eyewitness Testimony

• Evaluation of cognitive interview - Time consuming

  Cognitive interviews are time consuming. This is because it takes time to build up a relationship with the witness. Also, takes time for police officers to be trained to use it effectively and police officers lack time and resources to use it.

  Therefore, even though evidence points to the effectiveness of the cognitive interview, the time pressures and limited resources of the police can mean that the full cognitive interview is rarely used.
• Evaluation of cognitive interview - Kohnken et al (1999)n


  A meta analysis carried out by Kohnken draws attention to one of the potential problems with the cognitive interview.

  They analysed 42 studies that in total involved nearly 2,500 interviews. Whilst they found that on the one hand the cognitive interview led to an increase in correctly tracked information , when the enhanced cognitive interview was used there was more errors produced than original cognitive interview.
• Evaluation of cognitive interview - Fisher et al (1989)


  Sixteen experienced detectives recorded a selection of their interviews (real life cases of robbery) , using a standard interview technique.

  
  

  The detectives were then divided into two groups :

  - One group was trained to use the cognitive interview (7 detectives)

  - The other group (control) using the standard interview (9 detectives)

  
  

  Results :

  • The trained detectives elicited 46% more information after their cognitive interview training , in comparison to the control group.

  • They found that the detectives trained in the cognitive interview produced 63% more information than the untrained detectives.

  • Where it was possible to confirm the information, over 90% of it was found to be accurate.
• Evaluation of cognitive interview - Geiselman et al (1985)


  Participants watched police training films of stimulated violent crime (fake crime). 48 hours later they were then interviews individually by experienced police officers.

  
  

  They found :

  • The cognitive interview had higher numbers of correct items recalled.

  • The cognitive interview had the same error rate as the standard interview
• What are enhanced cognitive interviews?

  Interviewers should build a rapport (good relation) with the eyewitness as victims may be more comfortable to tell them than to tell a stranger.
• Why does changing perspective improve eye witness testimony?

  • May provide more cues for recall of other information

  • Disrupt the effects of schemas
• 4) Change perspective

  The eyewitness tries to recall the events from different perspective they have had during the crime as well as the perspectives of others that were present during the crime.
• Why does reverse the order improve eye witness testimony?

  • Schemes can potentially lead to errors - memories could be changed to fit in with what they expected to have happen based on past experiences.

  • Reversing the order is to designed to disrupt the effect of schemas
• 3) Reverse the order


  The event of the crime should be recalled in a different sequence that the order in which they saw the crime take place.
• Why does report everything improve eye witness testimony?

  • By recalling all information it could provide a cue for other information

  • Stop leading questions
• 2) Report everything

  The idea here is that the eyewitness is not to filter out or select what information to report. Anything and everything they can recall from the event , they should describe.
• Why does reinstate the context improve eye witness testimony?

  • Retrieval failure - cues are needed

  • Encoding specificity principle - cues at learning need to be present at recall
• 1) Reinstate the context


  Returning to the original crime scene (often in your mind) where cues may trigger the recall of memories.
• How can accuracy of eye witness testimony be improved?

  Fisher and Geiselman (1992) suggested :

  • Reinstate the context

  • Report everything

  • Reverse the order

  • Change perspective
• What is a cognitive interview?

  A questioning technique designed to improve the information that an eyewitness can retrieve about a crime.
• How does anxiety have a positive effect on recall : Evaluating the research

  One of the main strengths of the research by Yuille and Cutshall, and Christiansen and Hubinette is that they were real life studies. This is because participants in these two studies were in real life setting. They really experienced anxiety and stress. Therefore this gives more realistic and ecologically valid set of results about eyewitness testimony.

  However, on the other hand with the benefit of higher ecological vitality often comes a lack of control of extraneous variables. For example for both Yuille and Cutshall, and Christiansen and Hubinette participants could have been influenced by post event discussion. They could have talked about what happened which strengthened their memory and news reports dining out days,weeks later which could have also helped consolidate their memory. Therefore this lack of control of the variables makes it harder therefore to establish cause and effect, to definitively conclude that high levels of anxiety cause better recall.
• How does anxiety have a positive effect on recall : Supporting evidence - Christiansen and Hubinette (1993)


  Research by Christiansen and Hubinette conducted a study called ' Hands up' . A study of witnesses emotional reactions and memories associated with bank robberies. They considered 22 real bank robberies and they found no evidence of high arousal having a negative impractical on recall. Witnesses could remember accurately the details they originally provided anywhere from 4-15 months later.

  Therefore, this suggest that highly emotional real life events are well remembers over time - anxiety can have a positive effect on eyewitness testimony.
• What did Yuille and Cutshall find?

  High levels of accuracy in their description of the event. Importantly the witnesses who had been most distressed at the time of the shooting gave the most accurate account 5 months later. Their accuracy was 93% in comparison to 75% accuracy for the other witnesses.
• Supporting Evidence - Yuille and Cutshall (1986)


  Research by Yuille and Cutshall investigated people who had been eyewitnesses to a real life, traumatic crime in Vancouver, Canada.

  They conducted a study of a real-life shooting in a gun shop. The shop owner shot a thief dead. They were 21 witnesses of the crime who were all interviewed by the police at the time. Yuille and Cutshall contacted those 21 four to five months later, and 13 of them agreed to be interviewed as part of the study. They then compared these interviews with the original police interviews made at the time of the shooting. Witnesses were Ali's asked to rate how stressed they felt at the time of the incident, and if they had any emotional problems since the event (e.g. sleeplessness)
• How does anxiety have a positive effect on recall?

  The stress of witnessing a crime or

  accident created anxiety though physiological arousal within the body. The fight or flight response is triggered which increases our alertness and improve our memory for the event because we become more aware of cues in the situation.
• Why was recall poorer in condition 2?

  Recall was poor in condition 2 because the participants attention had been focused on the weapon ( the knife).
• Anxiety has a negative effect on recall : Supporting Evidence - Johnson and Scott (1976)


  Participants in this study were told to have a seat in a waiting room outside a laboratory whilst they waited for the study to start.

  They were two conditions on this study:

  •Condition 1 ( no weapon/low anxiety)

  They overheard a discussion taking place in the laboratory about some equipment not working. A man then left the laboratory carrying a pen with grease on his hand.

  • Condition 2 (weapon/high anxiety)

  They overheard a heated argument in the laboratory followed by the sound of glass breaking and crashing chairs. A man then left the laboratory carting a knife covered in blood.

  
  

  The participants were asked later to identify the man from a set of 50 photographs.

  They found that : 49% could recall the man from condition 1 (low anxiety) but only 33% could recall them from the 2 condition.
• How does anxiety have a negative effect on recall?

  Anxiety creates physiological arousal in the body which prevents us from paying attention to important cues , so recall is worse.
• Methodology for post event discussion

  Research by Loftus and Palmer (1974) and Gabbert et al (2003) can be praised for being conducted in highly controlled experimental settings. This is because their is careful control of extraneous variables so that cause and effect can be established. Additionally this high level of control enables the research to be replicated to check the reliability of the findings. Therefore the quality of this research strengthens the argument for how misleading information can affect eyewitness testimony.

  On the other hand, one of the main draw backs to this type of research is that they are artificial studies into eyewitnesses testimony. For example both Loftus and Palmer (1974) and Gabbert et al (2003) showed participants video recordings of events. This is a problem because the participants in the studies are not actually eyewitnesses to real crimes. The level of anxiety and seriousness that would be present for an eyewitness to a real event is simply missing. Additionally , one of the criticisms specifically with Loftus and Palmer's research relates to the sample. This is because their participants were 45 American university students who are not very representative of the general population particularly in a piece of research into driving with their limited years of any of driving. Their estimate of speed may not be accurate. Therefore, this sampling issue undermines the research and further raised questions about the role of misleading information of eyewitnesses testimony.
• Supporting evidence for post event discussion : Gabbert et al (2003)


  Fiona Gabbert studied participants in pairs. Her sample consisted of 60 students from the university of Aberdeen and 60 older adults recruited from a local community.

  
  

  Each participant watched a video of the same crime but filmed from different points of view. This meant that each participant could see elements in the event that the others could not :

  • Only witness A could read the title of the book the girl was carrying.

  • Only witness A could see that she throws a piece of paper into the bin when she leaves the room.

  • Only witness B could see the girl checking the time on her watch.

  • Only witness B can watch her committing the crime if sliding a £10 note out of a wallet and putting it into her pocket.

  
  

  The participants in pairs were told that they had watched the same video, however that had in fact seen different perspectives of the same crime and only one person had actually witnessed the girl stealing.

  After watching the video, the participants then completed a questionnaire on their recall of what happened . They either did this individually ( which was the control condition) or with another participant, where post event discussion would take place (co-witness condition).

  
  

  Results:

  They found that 71% of witness in the co-witness condition reported information that they have gathered from the other witness and 60% of participants in the co-witness group reported that the girl was guilty of a crime even though they had not actually witnessed it taking place.

  Therefore this study shows that post event discussion can influence recall of a crime and show another way that misinformation can influence the accuracy of eyewitness testimony.
• What is post-event discussion?

  Witnesses of the same event discuss the details of a crime after it has occurred .
• Practical application (cognitive interview) for leading questions.

  One of the main strengths of the research that has been conducted into misleading information , such as Loftus and Palmer, is that it has real world practical application for police and lawyers.

  For example, a techniques for interviewing eye witnesses has been developed known as the cognitive interview. One part has been directly shaped by the use of such questions and instead asks participants to report everything. This giver eyewitnesses the opportunity to recall all the information that occurred without filtering it for relevance. Therefore this demonstrates the value of research into Kai leading information in how it improves the accuracy of eye witness testimony.
• Supporting evidence for leading questions : Loftus and Palmer (1974) - Experiment 2


  In their second experiment, 150 students (50 for each condition) were shown a one minute film that ended with a multiple car accident. They were then given a questionnaire. This first asked them to simply describe the accident in their own words, and then they were given some specific questions to answer. The critical question was once again about the speed of the vehicle , but this time there were three versions :

  1 - About how fast was the car going when they smashed into each other.

  2 - About how fast was the car going when they bumped into each other.

  3 - Not asked any question about the speed ( control group)

  
  

  One weak later the participants were then asked a series of questions about what they had watched the week before. Hiding amongst a bunch of other questions was this critical question : 'did you see any broken glass?'.

  They found that participants would be more likely to say there was in condition one.
• Supporting evidence for leading questions : Loftus and Palmer (1974) - Experiment 1

  Loftus and Palmer arranged for participants (students) to watch film clips of car accidents and then have them questions about the accident. In the critical questions (a leading question) participants were asked to describe how fast the cars were travelling .

  In each group the speed estimate question was differently phrased (e.g. group 1: how fast were the cars going when they smashed into each other vs. group 5: how fast were the cars going when they contacted each other).

  The verbs used were smashed, contact, hit, bumped, collided.

  Each group recalled the crash at different speeds.

  This is a leading question because the verb 'hit suggests the speed the car was going. There were give groups of participants, and each was given a different verb in the critical question. One group had the verb 'hit; the others had contacted, bumped, collided or smashed.

  
  

  RESULTS: The mean estimated speed was calculated for each group. The verb contacted had the estimated speed of 31.8, whilst the word smashed had the mean speed as 40.8 mph.

  Therefore, this study supports how leading questions can bias the eyewitnesses recall of an event.
• What are leading questions?

  Leading questions are questions which prompt or encourage an answer that is wanted by the person asking the question.
• What are factors affecting the accuracy of eyewitness testimony?

  Misleading information : (1) Leading questions , Misleading information : (2) Post Event Discussion and Anxiety.
• What is eyewitness testimony?

  The ability of people to remember the details of events, such as crimes, which they themselves have observed .