Summary
Summary Cognitive Approach Contemporary debate
- Course
- Institution
- Book
Notes on the contemporary debate on the cognitive approach in psychology
[Show more]
Connected book
Book Title:
Author(s):
- Edition:
- ISBN:
- Edition:
More summaries for
-
The ethics and efficacy of using conditioning on children
-
‘If therapies from cognitive, biological and psychodynamic approaches work as treatments, why do we need positive psychology?’
-
Essay: The Reliability of Eye Witness Testimony
Seller
FollowLrowland
Reviews received
Content preview
The Reliability of Eyewitness Testimony• While human memory is generally accurate, over time it degrades for two main reasons;
information fades over time and memory can be distorted by post event information.
• The reliability of EWT is of huge importance in criminal proceedings, and The Innocence
Project claims that incorrect EWT is the leading cause of wrongful convictions.
• It is therefore vital that we understand how memory works, what can alter it and how we can
prevent this from happening.
• Devlin Committee (1974): Of 347 cases were persecution occurs with only EWT, 74 resulted in
conviction.
• In a court, witnesses are instructed to give only the truth, which suggests there are two
possibilities; lying and not. However, a third possibility is that someone will tell their truth
however what they can remember is not an accurate depiction of what actually happened.
Eyewitnesses are not Reliable
Post Event Information
• Loftus and Palmer (1974): Information from this classic research showed that information
suggested or implied after an event can be incorporated into the memory.
• Loftus and Zanni (1975): 7% of participants asked ‘Did you see a broken headlight?’ Said they
saw one, compared with 17% who were asked ‘Did you see the broken headlight?’.
• The Post Event Information and independent variable was the word A or The.
• The research demonstrates that even subtle changes in the wording used in questions can
influence a participant’s recollection.
• This suggests that a witness’s recollection of an event may be distorted depending on how
they are questioned by their family, friends, police and lawyers.
• People can distort their own memories through self-generation, when the eyewitness can
introduce new information simply by thinking about a robbery.
• Overtime it becomes harder to differentiate between which was actually observed, and
information introduced later on.
• Often the effect of post event information is inconsequential, however, when an eyewitness to
a crime it is important to know exactly what happened.
• The distortion in memory which results from post event information is referred to as the
misinformation effect.
• According to the trace strength theory of suggestibility, if a child is recalling an event that was
experienced several times, he or she would be expected to have a more accurate memory of
the event and be less vulnerable to suggestive influences such as biased interviewing
procedures than if the event had occurred only once.
• This is especially important in child abuse cases because it is common for a perpetrator to
frequently abuse the same child.
• An important constraint on the effect of post event suggestion is that implausible events are
less likely to be suggestively planted in memory than plausible events
Crimes are Emotive Experiences
• Wells, Memon and Penrod (2006): The emotional experience of an eyewitness is one of the
main variables which effect the reliability of eyewitness testimony.
• The central argument is that individuals who witness a negative emotional event will
remember central details but have impaired memory of peripheral details.
• The two working definitions of central are central to the actual scene of a crime, as in the
foreground, and central to the plot of an event thus studies provide varying results of what
people remember.
• Stein and Memon (2006): Descriptions of actions may be recalled to different levels of
completeness and accuracy than person descriptions.
• Eyewitnesses may not be reliable because crimes are so unexpected and potentially
traumatising that memories may be repressed.
• Repression is an idea put forward by Freud and is an Ego Defense Mechanism whereby
threatening memories are pushed into the unconscious mind.
• Today some psychologists call it ‘motivated forgetting’ but either way eyewitness testimony is
not reliable because the crime can have such an emotive effect.
• Research suggests that high stress can seriously impair a person’s ability to identify a
perpetrator even if they were encountered for a considerable amount of time.
The benefits of buying summaries with Stuvia:
Guaranteed quality through customer reviews
Stuvia customers have reviewed more than 700,000 summaries. This how you know that you are buying the best documents.
Quick and easy check-out
You can quickly pay through credit card or Stuvia-credit for the summaries. There is no membership needed.
Focus on what matters
Your fellow students write the study notes themselves, which is why the documents are always reliable and up-to-date. This ensures you quickly get to the core!
Frequently asked questions
What do I get when I buy this document?
You get a PDF, available immediately after your purchase. The purchased document is accessible anytime, anywhere and indefinitely through your profile.
Satisfaction guarantee: how does it work?
Our satisfaction guarantee ensures that you always find a study document that suits you well. You fill out a form, and our customer service team takes care of the rest.
Who am I buying these notes from?
Stuvia is a marketplace, so you are not buying this document from us, but from seller Lrowland. Stuvia facilitates payment to the seller.
Will I be stuck with a subscription?
No, you only buy these notes for $6.99. You're not tied to anything after your purchase.
Can Stuvia be trusted?
4.6 stars on Google & Trustpilot (+1000 reviews)
78462 documents were sold in the last 30 days
Founded in 2010, the go-to place to buy study notes for 14 years now