Fisher et al. (1989)

Fisher et al. (1989)

1. Backgound

   • What is an interview? An interview is simply trying to elicit information from a person or witness, while keeping the information valid. Firstly, Loftus showed the impact that leading questions could have upon participant recall and she concluded than an actual change in memory had occurred.
     • Memory is easily malleable, changing how a questions is asked can change the memory itself.
     • This study focuses not at the normal interviews that the police conduct but something called the enhanced cognitive interview.
       • The CI has two underlining assumptions:
         • It is possible to access memories from different retrieval points
         • Retrieval from memory will be more effective if at the time of retrieval the context of the original event can be reinstated.
   • 4 main retrieval points
     • Interview similarity - an attempt to reinstate the context of memory, interview must take account of the external factors. How were the participants feeling emotionally? What was the weather like?
     • Focused Retrieval - this is also called free recall. Interviewees are encouraged to recall as much as possible without interruptions from the person conducting the interview.
     • Extensive retrieval - the interviewer makes as many attempts as possible at retrieval from many entry points. Irrelevant parts are requested by the interviewer in order to maximise the amount recalled, as the more irrelevant details that the interviewee recalls the more likely they are to remember something significant through association.