Eyewitness Testimony

?
The cognitive interview...
A - can only be used in Western cultures.
B - takes longer than the standard interview.
C - involves unethical treatment of witnesses.
D - requires special training of police officers.
E - cannot be used to interview children.
B - takes longer than the standard interview.
D - requires special treatment of police officers.
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Psychologists have carried out research into the use of cognitive interviews. One possible ethical issue which might arise during this research is protection of participants from harm. Explain how psychologists could deal with this ethical issue.
One way in which psychologists could deal with this issue is through making it clear that participants have a right to withdraw. If a participant is showing that they are distressed, the psychologist should remind them that they have the right to withdraw
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Traditionally, police have questioned eyewitnesses using the standard interview procedure. This involves a period of free recall about an event, followed by specific questions. However, an increasing number of police forces are now using the cognitive int
The cognitive interview differs from a standard interview due to four components: report everything, change perspective, change order, and reinstate the context. Reporting everything encourages the interviewee to recall everything, even if it may seem irr
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One technique used in cognitive interviews is 'report everything'. When using this technique, the police officer in this investigation read the following instructions to the participants:

"Please tell me everything you can remember in the film. Do not l
Another technique that the police officer could have used is reinstating the context. The instructions that the police officer could have read out to the participants could have been "Please imagine the situation again, and tell me about all of the surrou
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The psychologists also recorded the number of correct items recalled and the number of incorrect items recalled in each type of interview. The following results were obtained.

From these results, what might the psychologist conclude about the effectivene
The mean number of correct items recalled in a cognitive interview (45) was higher than the number of correct items recalled in a standard interview (32). However, the number of incorrect items recalled remained the same (8) throughout both types of inter
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A psychologist was at a concert where someone threw a bottle onto the stage and seriously injured one of the band members. The psychologist decided to use this incident to investigate the accuracy of eyewitness testimony. She asked 10 people who saw the b
10 people = 150 minutes.
1000 people = 150 x 100
1000 people = 15000 minutes.
15000 / 60 = 250 hours.
1000 people = 250 hours.
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b) Identify one type of data the psychologist collected in this study. Explain your answer.
Quantitative data was collected. This is because the questions the psychologist asked were closed, so there were only a select few answers that the participants could answer with. Therefore, the data collected was quantitative as the psychologist would ha
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c) Investigator effects may influence this study. Explain how the investigation might be modified to reduce these results.
A psychologist that had not witnessed the events could have interviewed each participant. This psychologist would not have their own perspective on what they saw at the concert and therefore this would not impact the results.
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d) The psychologist submitted a report of her investigation to a journal for peer review. What would she expect the process to involve?
Her report would be sent to other psychologists to be reviewed. They would consider things such as the validity, ethical concerns, errors made, the significance of the research, originality (to ensure the same research had not been carried out before), an
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A psychologist carried out a field experiment to investigate the accuracy of eyewitness testimony. The participants were pupils and parents attending a school concert. Just before the concert began, two professional actors had an argument on the stage. Du
A field experiment takes place in the real world, rather than in a carefully controlled environment. The IV is manipulated by the experimenter.
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b) Other than ethical issues, outline one weakness of using a field experiment in this investigation.
One weakness of using a field experiment is that there is a lack of control over confounding and extraneous variables. In this experiment, the participants would have been different distances from the staged argument, and therefore may not have been able
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c) Suggest why the psychologist included the question about the man in glasses.
This is a leading question, and therefore would have been used to see if participants would be influenced by the question and give a 'wrong answer'. This would suggest that the question has influenced their retelling of events.
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Other cards in this set

Card 2

Front

Psychologists have carried out research into the use of cognitive interviews. One possible ethical issue which might arise during this research is protection of participants from harm. Explain how psychologists could deal with this ethical issue.

Back

One way in which psychologists could deal with this issue is through making it clear that participants have a right to withdraw. If a participant is showing that they are distressed, the psychologist should remind them that they have the right to withdraw

Card 3

Front

Traditionally, police have questioned eyewitnesses using the standard interview procedure. This involves a period of free recall about an event, followed by specific questions. However, an increasing number of police forces are now using the cognitive int

Back

Preview of the front of card 3

Card 4

Front

One technique used in cognitive interviews is 'report everything'. When using this technique, the police officer in this investigation read the following instructions to the participants:

"Please tell me everything you can remember in the film. Do not l

Back

Preview of the front of card 4

Card 5

Front

The psychologists also recorded the number of correct items recalled and the number of incorrect items recalled in each type of interview. The following results were obtained.

From these results, what might the psychologist conclude about the effectivene

Back

Preview of the front of card 5
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