Zusammenfassung der Ressource
Memory- factors affecting eyewitness
testimony: misleading information
- Leading questions
- Loftus and Palmer, 1974
- Asked participants to watch a video of a car crash
- They then asked questions about the crash, with one leading question
- 'How fast were the cars going when they ___________________ into each other?'
- In the gap, different verbs were used
- Hit
- Smashed
- Average speed: 40.5mph
- Bumped
- Collided
- Contacted
- Average speed: 31.8mph
- Response bias explanation
- Wording has no effect on memories, but
affects how participants choose to respond
- Substitution explanation
- Wording changed participants' memory of the crash
- Participants who heard 'smashed' were more likely to also report broken glass, even though there was none
- Post event discussion
- Gabbert, 2003
- Participants all watched a video of the same
crime, but from different perspectives. This
meant they could see different elements of the
crime scene.
- The participants then discussed what
they had seen.For example, one
participant could see the title of a book
being carried while the other could not
- 71% of participants reported elements
of the crime that they had not seen
- No participants in a control group in
which there was no post event discussion
reported anything they had not seen
- Evaluation
- Real life application
- Research into misleading information
has useful application in EWTs
- Useful for the legal system
- Artificial tasks
- The tasks given to participants were not real-
they watched film clips. Were they actually
there, their response may have been different
- Individual differences
- Age
- Elderly people are less accurate in EWTs
- Demand characteristics
- Want to be more helpful to the researcher