Protecting Eyewitness Evidence: Examining the Efficacy of a Self-Administered Interview Tool

Given the crucial role of eyewitness evidence, statements should be obtained as soon as possible after an incident. This is not always achieved due to demands on police resources. Two studies trace the development of a new tool, the Self-Administered Interview (SAI), designed to elicit a comprehensive initial statement. In Study 1, SAI participants reported more correct details than participants who provided a free recall account, and performed at the same level as participants given a Cognitive Interview. In Study 2, participants viewed a simulated crime and half recorded their statement using the SAI. After a delay of 1 week, all participants completed a free recall test. SAI participants recalled more correct details in the delayed recall task than control participants.     

Does free recall moderate the effect of mental context reinstatement instructions on children's cued recall?

Cognitive Interview instructions increase children's recall of events; one important instruction is the mental reinstatement of context. We examined one factor that may affect mental context reinstatement: whether children had the opportunity to freely recall the event before answering cued recall questions. One hundred and fifty-two children aged 6, 9, or 11 years were interviewed twice about a staged event. The event consisted of an argument between two adults about whose turn it was to show the children a film. One week after the event, some of the children received mental context reinstatement instructions before having their cued recall tested. Some children also received a free recall test immediately before the cued recall test. In the second interview, 2 weeks after the first interview, all children freely recalled the event. The results showed no effects of mental context reinstatement instructions and no moderating effect of free recall on children's cued recall. The implications of these findings and directions for future research are discussed.     

The cognitive interview: Much more than simply “try again”

Abstract

In the legal context, the elicitation of complete and accurate statements from witnesses and victims is essential. The Cognitive Interview (CI) was devised to improve eyewitnesses' memory by using mnemonic strategies which ask witnesses to think about what happened and encourage them to make as many retrieval attempts as possible. However, no known study has experimentally examined whether (or not) the CI superiority effect is something more than merely asking a witness to retrieve information four times. The aim of this study was to compare the recall obtained by means of the CI - in which mnemonics are used - to that obtained as a result of asking subjects to make a multiple free recall task - without using mnemonics - in a single interview session. It was expected that significant differences would still exist. Results confirmed this hypothesis.     

Can a witness report hearsay evidence unintentionally? The effects of discussion on eyewitness memory

Abstract

When eyewitnesses are exposed to misinformation about an event from a co-witness, they often incorporate this misinformation in their recall of the event. The current research aimed to investigate whether this memory conformity phenomenon is due to change in the witness's memory for the event, or to social pressures to conform to the co-witness's account. Participants were shown a crime video and then asked to discuss the video in groups, with some receiving misinformation about the event from their discussion partners. After a one-week delay some participants were warned about possible misinformation before all participants provided their own account of the event. In Study 1, participants made remember/know judgments about the items recalled, and in Study 2 they indicated the source of their memories. Co-witness information was incorporated into participants’ testimonies, and this effect was not reduced by warnings or source monitoring instructions, suggesting memory change may have occurred. However, there was some indication that remember/know judgments may help distinguish between ‘real’ memories and co-witness information.     

The Self-Administered Interview: a means of improving children's eyewitness performance?

Abstract

In order to obtain the most informative and correct statements, witnesses should be heard as soon as possible after the incident. However, this is not always possible. This experimental study investigated whether completing a Self-Administered Interview form (SAI) immediately after a critical event could enhance children's witness performance at a later stage. Children (N = 194, age 11–12) reported their memory of an event in a structured SAI, an open SAI, or did not report their memory (control). Two weeks later, the children were interviewed about the event. Before the interview, half of the children were subjected to social influence from a co-witness. Children's free recall of the event was enhanced by the SAI. More precisely, children in the SAI-Structured condition reported more details about the event than children in the SAI-Open condition and the control condition, without a loss of accuracy. The SAI manipulation did not, however, reduce children's vulnerability to social influence. The results suggest that the use of a SAI might prove a simple and yet effective way of increasing the quality of statements from child witnesses in some situations.     

Comparative analysis of true or false statements with the source monitoring model and the cognitive interview: special features of the false accusation of innocent people

Abstract

We describe two experiments designed to verify whether the source monitoring (SM) model categories and the cognitive interview (CI) contribute to distinguishing true from false statements. We used a 2 Type of Interview (Structured/Cognitive) × 2 Statement Condition (True/False) design with 18 interviewers in a sample group of 240 gender-matched university students being interviewed about a film fragment. In Experiment 1, participants who lied exculpated the protagonist from rape, whereas in Experiment 2 their lies were aimed at accusing an innocent person. As dependent variables we used criteria from the SM: details, supporting memories, thoughts and feelings and cognitive operations. The results suggest that the statements of honest participants interviewed using the CI provided more overall information than those obtained under any other condition. When a lie is aimed at exculpating someone from criminal behaviour, statements involve more cognitive operations and less sensory, temporal and contextual information, but only when the structured interview (SI) is used. When the lie is aimed at falsely accusing someone, the SI and the CI produce similar results. We discuss the forensic importance of these findings.     

Children's and adults’ realism in their event-recall confidence in responses to free recall and focused questions

Abstract

Two experiments examined the realism in the confidence of 8–9-year-olds, 12–13-year-olds and adults in their free recall and answers to focused questions after viewing a short video clip. A different video clip was shown in each experiment and the focused questions differed in difficulty. In both experiments the youngest age group, in contrast to the two other age groups, showed no overconfidence in their confidence judgements for the free recall. The free recall results also showed that the youngest group had lower completeness but similar correctness as the adults. There was a tendency, over both experiments, for the participants to show poorer realism for the focused questions than for the free recall, especially when questions with content already mentioned in the free recall were excluded from the analyses of the focused questions in Experiment 1. The study shows the importance of question format when evaluating the credibility of the confidence shown by 8–9-year-old children in their own testimony.     

The enhanced cognitive interview: expressions of uncertainty,motivation and its relation with report accuracy

The Enhanced Cognitive Interview (ECI) is one of the most widely studied and used methods to interview witnesses. However, ECI research has mainly focused on increasing report size and somewhat overlooked how to improve and evaluate report accuracy. No study evaluated if witnesses’ spontaneous expressions of uncertainty are accurate metacognitive judgments, nor if witnesses’ motivation during the interview affects report accuracy. This study examined how witnesses’ judgments of recall ‘uncertainty’ and their motivation perception could relate to report accuracy. Forty-four psychology students watched a mock robbery video recording and were interviewed 48 hours later with either the Portuguese version of the ECI or a Structured Interview (SI). Afterward, participants’ motivation was assessed and items of information were classified as ‘certainties’ or ‘uncertainties’. Results suggest that our ECI protocol was effective, since participants interviewed with the ECI produced more information without compromising accuracy. ‘Uncertainties’ were less accurate than ‘certainties’, and their exclusion raised overall, ECI, and SI, accuracy. More motivated participants had better recall accuracy. Accounting for witnesses’ motivation and spontaneous verbal expressions of uncertainty may be effective and time-saving procedures to increase accuracy. These are key points that professionals and researchers should consider.     

A review of the cognitive interview

Abstract

In this critique of the Cognitive Interview (CI), discussion is organized around four themes; (1) the effectiveness of various components of the CI, (2) the relationship between the CI and other interviewing methods such as the Guided Memory Interview, the Standard Interview, and the Structured Interview, (3) different measures of memory performance and (4) the effect of training quality on interviewer performance. We comment on some of the theoretical and methodological issues to be considered in CI research and the practical considerations relating to the use of the CI in the field.     

Equipping witnesses with transferable skills: the Self-Administered Interview©

The Self-Administered Interview^© (SAI) is a novel investigative interview tool with potential practical benefits. Research revealed that the SAI increases the recall of correct information without a decrease in accuracy. In addition, it seems to prevent forgetting. Participants who had completed the SAI after viewing an event remembered more correct details following a delay than participants who did not have this early recall opportunity. The current study examined whether the beneficial effects of the SAI go beyond the well-established testing effect. Does the SAI make a good witness for one event or for a better witness in general? If the SAI provides general skills, its effects may transfer at least partially to a new event. Two groups of participants watched an event followed by SAI or free recall (FR) instructions. After a one-week delay participants were presented with a second event and received FR instructions. In addition to replicating the SAI effect, experienced SAI participants recalled more correct details for the second event than inexperienced individuals. The findings suggest that the SAI equips witnesses with transferable skills they can use during future retrieval of new events.     

THE COGNITIVE INTERVIEW AND ITS EFFECT ON WITNESSES’ CONFIDENCE

Today there is ample evidence that the Cognitive Interview (CI) enhances witnesses’ memory. However, less is known about how the CI affects eyewitnesses’ confidence. To address this shortcoming we conducted a study analyzing how realism in confidence was affected by the CI. All participants (n=79) were first shown a filmed kidnapping. After 2 weeks we interviewed one-third of the participants according to the guidelines of the CI, one-third according to a Standard Interview (SI), and one-third were not interviewed at all (Control condition). Participants in all three conditions were then asked to answer 45 forced-choice questions, and to give a confidence judgment after each choice. For the 45 questions, no differences in accuracy were found between the three conditions. Confidence was higher in the CI and SI conditions, compared with the Control condition. CI and SI did not differ in metacognitive realism but both showed lower realism compared with the Control condition, although only CI significantly so. The results indicate that the inflation in confidence is more likely to be explained in terms of a reiteration effect, than as a consequence of the particular mnemonics characterizing the CI (e.g. “mental reinstatement of context”). In sum, CI does not seem to impair (or improve) the realism in witnesses’ confidence, and does not inflate confidence in erroneous recall, compared to a SI.     

Age trends in eye-witness suggestibility and compliance

Abstract

This paper addresses two issues: whether there is a developmental trend in suggestibility to misleading post-event information, and whether suggestibility can be reduced by use of part of the cognitive interview. Twenty participants from each of three age groups (four-to-five year olds, eight-to-nine year olds and adults) watched a filmed event, and half of the participants in each age group were subsequently asked to recall everything they had seen using a method derived from the cognitive interview procedure. Following this, all participants were asked questions about the filmed event, some of which incorporated misleading information. Twenty four hours later the witnesses were interviewed again, this time critical questions were included about the truth of the presuppositions introduced in the initial questionnaire. It was found that although the eight-to-nine year olds were more suggestible than adults, the apparent greater suggestibility of very young children (four-to-five years) could potentially be explained in terms of heightened compliance to the perceived demands of the interviewer. The 'be complete' part of the cognitive interview only produced an improvement in performance for the eight-to-nine year olds.     

From laboratory to the street: Capturing witness memory using the Self‐Administered Interview

The Self‐Administered Interview (SAI^©) is a tool designed to elicit a comprehensive initial account from witnesses at the scene of an incident or shortly thereafter to inoculate against the loss of information associated with delayed interview. Drawing on the principles of the Cognitive Interview (CI), the SAI^© provides witnesses with a series of instructions and retrieval cues to support recall. Requesting that witnesses complete an SAI^© not only serves to preserve and protect memory but also enables officers to prioritize the allocation of policing resources during the critical early stages of an investigation. The current review traces the development of the SAI^© from a series of laboratory studies through to field trials and integrates our findings with theoretical accounts of human memory. We present new data from trials of the tool in the field and consider future avenues for research and further development of the SAI^©.     

Clothed and unclothed human figure drawings lead to more correct and incorrect reports of touch in children

Abstract

The purpose of the current study was to examine the effect of clothed and unclothed human figure drawings (HFDs) on children's reports of touch. Eighty 4/5-year-olds and 80 9/10-year-olds participated in a staged event in which measurements of their body parts (e.g. waistline) were taken. Specifically, they were touched on 10 different locations. Immediately or three weeks after the event, they had to report where they had been touched. Half of the children received a clothed HFD while the other half was provided with an unclothed HFD to assist children in their recall. When we compared children's recall before and after the presentation of a HFD, we found that clothed and unclothed HFDs significantly decreased the accuracy of children's reports of touch. So, although children reported more correct touches after the presentation of a HFD, they were also more likely to include more incorrect information in their reports of touch.     

The affective burden of separated mothers in PA(S) inflected custody law systems: a New Zealand case study

ABSTRACT

Custody law systems across the Anglo-West are increasingly characterised by the overt and covert use of parental alienation (syndrome) as an aid to the governance of post-separation mothers. Difficulties with care arrangements within PA(S) inflected custody law systems are often regarded as evidence of mothers’ alienating behaviours, resulting in a range of remedial, coercive and punitive censures, including losing resident parent status. I argue here that the synergistic interaction between custody law and PA(S) creates an affective burden for post-separation mothers. Drawing on the voices of mothers in contested custody cases, I show that their affective burden consists of negative emotional states for themselves and their children, emotion work in relation to these states, and court required emotion work in support of father-child relationships. The latter mitigates the risk of being found to be an alienator and losing what matters most to them – their children.     

Enhancing the cognitive interview with an alternative procedure to witness-compatible questioning: category clustering recall

The Cognitive Interview (CI) is one of the most widely studied and used methods to interview witnesses. However, new component techniques for further increasing correct recall are still crucial. We focused on how a new and simpler interview strategy, Category Clustering Recall (CCR), could increase recall in comparison with witness-compatible questioning and tested if a Revised Cognitive Interview (RCI) with CCR instead of witness-compatible questioning and without the change order and change perspective mnemonics would be effective for this purpose. Participants watched a mock robbery video and were interviewed 48 hours later with either the CI or the RCI. Recalled information was classified as either correct, incorrect or confabulation. Although exclusion of the change order and change perspective mnemonics in the RCI group might have caused a slight decrease in recall during the last interview phases, the RCI group generally produced more correct information than the CI group, with a lower number of confabulations. Further analyses revealed CCR was largely responsible for this increase in correct recall. CCR is a very promising interview technique which allowed the interviewer to obtain more detailed information without additional questions and may have, in certain situations, several practical advantages over a questioning phase.     

Enhancing Witness Memory with Focused Meditation and Eye-Closure: Assessing the Effects of Misinformation

Despite the decline in popularity of hypnosis as an investigative interviewing technique, this paper builds on previous research showing that some of the techniques employed in traditional hypnotic interviewing may still be useful in the development of simple, brief memory facilitation procedures for use by the police. Three experiments are described that investigate the effects of a short Focused Meditation with eye-closure technique in situations where participants are presented with misleading information. In the first study, which utilized a standard misinformation paradigm, a significant memory facilitation effect was shown with Focused Meditation, though the effect was not significant for eye-closure alone. There were no increases in errors when the Meditation and eye-closure procedures were used alone or in combination. The second experiment showed that a combined Focused Meditation with eye-closure technique reduced misinformation effects associated with fictitious events, and a third showed that the same technique reduced interrogative suggestibility effects as measured by the Gudjonsson Suggestibility Scale, whilst facilitating free recall memory. It is concluded that a Focused Meditation with eye-closure technique may potentially have applications in the field where brief alternatives to the Cognitive Interview are required.     

Nature and Impact of Criminal Victimization in Barbados

ABSTRACT

This article examines the nature and impact of crime through the survey of victims who reported crimes against them to the Barbados Police Force in 1998. The study shows that the victims reported serious concern about the high level of crime in Barbados. Further, the study found that concern about crime was influenced by many factors including the type of crime, age, gender, and occupation. In addition, the findings of the study pointed to physical injuries, economic cost, and emotional impacts on the victims, even though many victims underestimated the economic cost of their victimization.