Memory 3:

Memory 3:

1. Misleading Information

   • Leading questions suggest the desired answer
     • Loftus & Palmer - critical question contains hit, smashed, collided, bumped or contacted, speed estimates highest with the verb smashed
     • Loftus & Palmer - the verb altered the actual memory of the event; participants more likely to report broken glass
   • Post-event discussion may contaminate eyewitness memory of an event
     • Conformity effect - pps recollection influenced by discussion with others (Gabbert)
   • Repeat Interviewing - especially problematic with child witnesses (LeRooy)
   • Evaluation
     • Braun - misleading info (Bugs Bunny) altered pp recall
     • Real life EWT maybe more accurate - lab studies not taken seriously
       • Foster - film of supposed robbery, high accuracy
         • Yuile & Cutshall - witnesses to real crime fed misleading info but still accurate recall
     • Real-world application - mistaken EWT largest factor in conviction of innocent people (Wells and Olsen)
     • Individual differences - misinformation effect in older people, thus more susceptible to misleading info
     • Response bias - recalling events in original order led to recovery of recall so memory not altered (Bekerian & Bowers)

2. Anxiety

   • Stress (physiological arousal) reduces performance on complicated cognitive tasks
     • Johnson & Scott - weapon focus effect reduced accuracy of face identification
     • Loftus - motored eye movements during weapon exposure, focus was on a weapon
   • Evolutionary argument - it is adaptive to remember stress-inducing events
   • Christiainson & Hubinette - high-anxiety victims (bank tellers) remember most accurately
   • Deffenbacher - Yerkses-Dodson effect explains high accuracy at moderate levels of anxiety and low accuracy when anxiety is high (or low)
   • Evaluation
     • Pickel - weapon focus effect due to surprise not anxiety
     • Deffenbacher - real-life studies show even less accuracy than lab studies, so lab findings actually underestimate the effects of anxiety
     • Halford & Milne - kind of crime affects accuracy, e.g. victims of violent crime more accurate than non-violent crimes
     • Bothwell - neurotic pps become less accurate with increasing anxiety, opposite true for emotionally more stable pps
     • Deffenacher - catastrophe model better than inverted U

3. The Cognitive Interview

   • Based on psychological research
   • 1. Mental reinstatement of original context - physical and psychological, cued recall
     • 2. Report everything - even seemingly insignificant details, may cue recall
       • 3. Change order - reduces effect of schemas
         • Change perspective - disrupts schemas, supported by Anderson & Pichert's study (burglar and house buyer perspective)
   • Evaluation
     • Kohnken - review of 53 studies, 34% more info from CI but used lab studies with volunteer students
     • Mine & Bull - effectiveness may be most due to 'report everything' and 'mental reinstatement' components
     • Quality may suffer - 81% increase in correct recall but only 61% false positives (Kohnken)
     • Police dislike CI - time consuming, inadequate training
     • Individual differences - older adults' memories helped more by the CI than younger adults (Mello & Fisher)

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