Loftus and Palmer Alternative Evidence

Loftus and Zanni showed participants a film of a car accident, they then asked some participants "Did you see a broken headlight?" and others, "Did you see the broken headlight?" Of those asked about 'a' broken headlight, 7% reported seeing one, compared with 17% of people asked about 'the' broken headlight. This supports Loftus and Palmer's findings as the study also changed the form of a question, which affected the witness' response. Loftus and Palmer changed the verb 'smashed' and 'hit' to establish whether or not this would affect their answer.

Loftus showed participants a series of pictures of a man stealing a red wallet from a woman's bag. 98% later identified the colour correctly. When then being given a wrong description of the wallet as brown, participants persisted in describing the wallet as red. This refutes Loftus and Palmer's findings as the participants actually continued to describe the wallet as…