The indirectly generated tainted truth effect: warning is not necessary to worsen the testimony of non-misled persons

The purpose of the present research was to examine the indirectly generated tainted truth effect (TTE). The TTE refers to decreased accuracy on a memory test among persons who are erroneously warned about non-existent misinformation in material that describes an event. It was expected that the TTE would occur even without an explicit warning about misinformation, if one distinctive item of misinformation appeared in postevent material that also contained correct information that was consistent with the original material about the event (indirectly generated TTE: IGTTE). Experiment 1 produced the IGTTE and this effect was replicated in Experiment 2. Experiment 2 showed that the classic and indirect versions of the TTE usually occurred among persons who incorrectly monitored the source of information. Experiment 3 replicated the IGTTE using a procedure that included an additional phase between presenting the original and postevent material – initial testing. When the initial testing procedure was administered in Experiment 3, the TTE was smaller; however, this initial testing procedure had no effect on the IGTTE.     

Reinforced self-affirmation as a method for reducing the eyewitness misinformation effect

The misinformation effect occurs when an eyewitness includes information in their account that is incongruent with the event they witnessed, and stems from being exposed to incorrect external sources. Yet little research has been undertaken on techniques that could protect eyewitnesses from the influence of misinformation, despite the dangerous consequences of distorted testimony. In this article, a method of enhancing self-confidence, called reinforced self-affirmation (RSA), was proven to reduce the misinformation effect in five experiments. First, participants watched or heard an original event take place. They were then exposed to post-event material containing false information about that event, and finally they were given a memory test about the original material. The RSA, which took place either before the post-event material or before the final test, consisted of self-affirmation (recalling the greatest achievements in life) and external positive feedback (simulated ‘good’ results in a memory test or fake favourable results on personality tests). A meta-analysis of all five experiments revealed that the overall effect of RSA on reducing the misinformation was significant (effect size of 0.94), suggesting that this technique has the potential to be developed for practical use to make eyewitnesses less vulnerable to misinformation.     

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 effects of immediate recall on eyewitness accuracy and susceptibility to misinformation

Eyewitnesses can be influenced by misinformation that they encounter when discussing the event with a co-witness. Some studies have found that an immediate recall of the event can inoculate eyewitnesses against such misinformation; others have found that it increases susceptibility to misinformation. These different findings may be due to methodological factors, so the aim of this study was to investigate the effects of three different recall conditions. An immediate cued recall, free recall or no recall was given to 88 participants after they watched a crime video. They then discussed the video with a confederate who introduced correct and incorrect information about the video. Accuracy and amount of recall was tested one week later. It was found that the immediate-recall questionnaire did not make participants more susceptible to misinformation in comparison to no-recall participants, indeed the data trended the other way, suggesting that immediate-recall inoculated participants against misinformation. Furthermore, the provision of correct post-event information increased memory accuracy, especially after immediate recall.     

Say it to my face: Examining the effects of socially encountered misinformation

Objectives. Errors in eyewitness accounts can occur when a witness comes into contact with post‐event ‘misinformation’. A common way to encounter misinformation is through face‐to‐face interaction, in particular, via conversation with other individuals who also witnessed the crime. The current research compares this kind of misinformation with the non‐social post‐event narrative method typically employed in laboratory studies. Method. Young (17–33 years) and older (58–80 years) adults viewed a simulated crime event on video and were later exposed to four items of misinformation about it. The misinformation items were either introduced as part of a discussion about the event with a confederate or were embedded within a written narrative about the event that participants were asked to read. A questionnaire containing 20 items about the event was given to participants before and after the experimental manipulation. Results. Participants were less accurate than controls on questionnaire items after encountering misinformation. More importantly, misinformation encountered socially was significantly more misleading than misinformation from a non‐social source. This was true for both young and older adults. Conclusion. Misinformation encountered socially produced more errors than misinformation from a non‐social source. This finding has implications both for applied (forensic) and theoretical understanding of eyewitness memory.     

How to induce resistance to the misinformation effect? Characteristics of positive feedback in the reinforced self-affirmation procedure

ABSTRACT

The memory misinformation effect consists in the inclusion in witness testimonies of information from sources other than the given event. In the present article, research which aims to make people resistant to misinformation is presented. It is based on reinforced self-affirmation (RSA), a method designed to enhance participants’ self-confidence and therefore make them more willing to rely on their own memories instead of external sources. RSA includes self-affirmation and positive feedback. In the present research, the efficacy of various kinds of positive feedback was explored. The results of Experiment 1 suggested that positive feedback relating to memory (MemRSA) is effective in reducing the misinformation effect, while positive feedback relating to general cognitive ability is not. In Experiment 2, the superiority of MemRSA over inefficient feedback relating to attention was demonstrated. In Experiment 3, MemRSA was again effective, and more effective than inducing convictions about the independence of judgements, but this also reduced the misinformation effect. The results are discussed from the perspective of witnesses who remember the correct information yet rely on external sources due to a lack of confidence in t aforementioned heir memories.     

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.     

Forced confabulation more strongly influences event memory if suggestions are other‐generated than self‐generated

Purpose. Virtually all eyewitnesses to a crime, who eventually testify in court, are interviewed by police officers at least once. How do these interviews affect what the eyewitnesses are subsequently likely to report? The purpose of this study is to compare the relative impact of self‐ versus other‐generated misinformation on confabulated memory about an event. Self‐generated misinformation can occur by encouraging eyewitnesses to guess or speculate about possible answers to questions about which they report having no memory. Other‐generated misinformation can occur by having an investigator suggest an answer to an eyewitness. Methods. After viewing a 5 minutes crime video, participants answered written questions. One week later these same questions were answered again. We specifically focused on individuals' answers to unanswerable questions that probed information not actually presented in the video. If a participant answered an unanswerable question, we know that their answer was confabulated because the information was not presented in the video. Results. If an answer to an unanswerable question was forced confabulated at time 1, that answer was more likely to be repeated at time 2 if it had been other‐generated (suggested in the question) rather than self‐generated (fabricated by the participant). Conclusions. Pressuring eyewitnesses to answer questions about an event, when they indicate that they do not know the answer, can result in false confabulations. Answers suggested by the investigator are more likely to be repeated later than are answers that are simply self‐generated or speculated by the eyewitness. These results are consistent with the reality monitoring framework and ‘recollect‐to‐reject’ metacognitive reasoning strategies.     

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 and its effect on misleading postevent information

Abstract

The present study investigated the effectiveness of the cognitive interview on reducing the impact of the misinformation effect. A 2×2 between-groups design was used, with interview type (cognitive or structured) and narrative type (misleading or neutral) as the independent variables. Adults (n=40) viewed video footage depicting a bank robbery and then received either a misleading or neutral postevent narrative. Participants were interviewed with either a cognitive or a structured interview regarding their memory for the original footage. The cognitive interview produced significantly more correct pieces of information than the structured interview, without an increase in errors or confabulations. An anomalous significant interaction was found regarding the number of incorrect pieces of information, where recipients of the structured interview made more recall errors when receiving neutral postevent information compared to neutral postevent information. A misinformation effect was successfully achieved but the enhancing effects of the cognitive interview were unable to reduce it. Results are discussed within the misinformation effect theoretical framework. The limitations of the present study are also discussed.     

Misremembering Events: Emotional Valence,Psychopathic Traits,and the Misinformation Effect

Past research has demonstrated increased susceptibility to misinformation under varying conditions, including negative emotional scenes. In addition, psychopathic traits have been associated with emotional deficits which may lead to differences in memory processing. The present study examined emotional valence and psychopathic traits in relation to the misinformation effect. Participants (n = 334) were exposed to emotional scenes (positive, neutral, negative), completed a measure of psychopathic traits (PPI-R), and were asked either misleading or nonleading questions. Accuracy and susceptibility to misinformation were assessed through a series of open-ended questions and accuracy scoring. Accuracy was highest for both emotional (60%) relative to neutral (53.9%) images. Memory differences in recall of negative versus positive scenes was evidenced dependent on attentional focus. Participants in the misled condition were less accurate in their recall overall, and recalled more misleading information (41.18% relative to 14.16%). In addition, individuals who received misleading suggestions were more likely to incorporate the major misleading detail into their memory for the negative scene. Psychopathic traits were not related to accuracy; however, those high in psychopathic traits tended to incorporate more misinformation into memory. Our results have important implications concerning how individuals remember emotional events, including people high in psychopathic traits, and follow up studies considering attention/motivation and misinformation are required.     

论我国“精神卫生法”的称谓

我国2013年5月实施的《精神卫生法》以“精神卫生法”命名,这一称谓无法涵盖该法的全部规范、立法目的,容易将该法的社会法性质误解成行政法,还可能影响法的实施,与其他国家立法称谓的变化趋势相脱节.因此,基于明确立法目的,保护精神障碍者基本权利的社会法性质,顺应当今全体国民的精神健康追求,以及我国加入的国际人权公约等因素,我国现行“精神卫生法”宜正名为“精神健康法”.     

The Suggestibility of Children's Memory for Being Touched: Planting,Erasing, and Changing Memories

Investigates recent claims that it is relatively easy to suggestively plant false memories in children, by comparing the relative vulnerability to suggestibility of changed, planted, and erased memories. 80 4-year-olds and 80 10-year-olds either were touched in a specific way or were not touched at all, and it was later suggested that a different touch, a completely new touch, or no touch at all had occurred. The suggestibility effect occurred only in the changed memory condition; the difference between the experimental changed condition and the corresponding control condition was significant. In the planted and erased memory conditions no suggestibility effect occurred; there was no significant reduction in the experimental groups relative to the corresponding control conditions. Thus, although it is relatively easy to suggest to a child a change in an event that was experienced, it is less likely that an event can be planted in or erased from memory. It is thus inappropriate to provide courtroom testimony regarding the probability of suggestively planting false memories based on the classic suggestibility research, which has largely been restricted to the study of suggestively changing memories.     

Attribution of crime motives biases eyewitnesses’ memory and sentencing decisions

In court, the basic expectation is that eyewitness accounts are solely based on what the witness saw. Research on post-event influences has shown that this is not always the case and memory distortions are quite common. However, potential effects of an eyewitness’ attributions regarding a perpetrator’s crime motives have been widely neglected in this domain. In this paper, we present two experiments (N?=?209) in which eyewitnesses were led to conclude that a perpetrator’s motives for a crime were either dispositional or situational. As expected, misinformation consistent with an eyewitness’ attribution of crime motives was typically falsely recognised as true whereas inconsistent misinformation was correctly rejected. Furthermore, a dispositional vs. situational attribution of crime motives resulted in more severe (mock) sentencing supporting previous research. The findings are discussed in the context of schema-consistent biases and the effect of attributions about character in a legal setting.     

The prevalence of compassion fatigue,compassion satisfaction and perceived stress,and their relationships with mental toughness,individual differences and number of self-care actions in a UK police force

ABSTRACT

Police personnel are likely to be affected by stress and compassion fatigue, which may have important consequences for health, well-being and job performance. There are certain individual differences which may protect against compassion fatigue, for example mental toughness, personality and self-care behaviours. However, there is little research examining all of these constructs in combination with policing. The current study aimed to gather information regarding the prevalence of compassion fatigue, compassion satisfaction and perceived stress within a large UK police force, and their relationships with personality, mental toughness and self-care activities. A questionnaire was completed by 605 police employees within a UK police force. The results demonstrated that 20% of personnel suffered from negative psychological outcomes and that these outcomes were predicted by individual differences and self-care activities. The requirement for shift work, and mental toughness scores, significantly predicted compassion satisfaction, compassion fatigue and perceived stress. The analyses also revealed a role for gender, tenure, personality and self-care in several aspects of well-being. The implications of these findings are discussed, considering the current contexts in which policing operates, with the aim of improving the psychological well-being of police officers and staff.     

The saliency of gestural misinformation in the perception of a violent crime

Recent research has revealed that misinformation from gestures can influence eyewitness memory. However, it is still unclear whether gestural misinformation can emulate the effects of verbal misinformation on the reporting of major details in serious crimes. To investigate the salience of suggestions provided nonverbally, and how these compare to those made verbally, two experiments were conducted. In Experiment 1, participants watched footage of a crime scene and were presented with one of two types of gestures during questioning that suggested different interpretations of the crime. The results confirmed that the gestures influenced responses, with participants altering their interpretation of the crime according to the information gestured to them. Experiment 2 built on this to investigate how comparable gestural influence was to verbal influence. The results revealed that gestural misinformation caused participants to alter their interpretation of the crime and elicited the same effects as verbal misinformation. Across the two experiments, participants were unlikely to identify the misleading gestures or report feeling misled by them. These results reveal new insights into the strength of gestural misinformation and show that, despite their subtle nature in communication, gestures can exert a powerful influence in eyewitness interviews.     

Post-Event Information Affects Children’s Autobiographical Memory After One Year

In two experiments, we examined whether post-event information (PEI) about true and false events persisted in children’s reports after approximately 1 year. In Experiment 1, 4- to 6-year-olds were given PEI and then were given memory tests 2 weeks and 15 months later. Although PEI appeared in free recall at the initial testing, it decreased substantially by the long-term test. In contrast, on recognition tasks the children showed facilitation and misinformation effects at initial and follow-up tests. Experiment 2 replicated lasting misinformation and facilitation effects in recognition memory among 4- to 9-year-olds who were tested after 1-week and 10-month delays. We conclude that true and false reminders about an experienced event continue to affect children’s memory approximately 1 year later.

Inoculation or Antidote? The Effects of Cognitive Interview Timing on False Memory for Forcibly Fabricated Events

This study examined whether a cognitive interview (CI) can counteract the effects of suggestive interviews involving forced fabrication. College students witnessed a filmed event and were later forced to fabricate answers to misleading questions about the event. All witnesses were interviewed with a non-leading CI or free recall (FR) either before or after the forced fabrication phase. A week later participants completed a recognition and source monitoring (SM) test of video content. Relative to FR, the CI administered before the forced fabrication interview increased reports of correct details and reduced false assents to fabricated items. A CI after resulted in false memory rates comparable to the FR group. Early interviews using CI techniques may protect against memory loss and misinformation effects.     

Sexual offenders with serious mental illness: prevention, risk, and clinical concerns

Individuals with serious and persistent mental illness who have also engaged in illegal sexual behavior present a unique challenge for our legal and clinical systems. Frequently, these individuals may engage in problematic sexual behaviors which result in hospitalization rather than incarceration, and an overburdened and resource-deficient public community mental health system is ill-equipped to address the seriousness of these sexual behaviors. We have a rather limited understanding of how prevention programs, intervention strategies, and risk assessment would work with this population. Here we evaluate data from a sample of 245 inpatient psychiatric sexual offenders in a forensic mental health setting and compare these with what information has already been presented in some of the literature. Through an examination of seriously mentally ill sexual offenders and their clinical presentation, legal history, and risk management concerns, we illustrate a variety of tertiary prevention needs. Future directions in the area of prevention and risk management for seriously mentally ill sexual offenders are also discussed.     

Eyewitness Memory,Suggestibility, and Repeated Recall Sessions in Children with Mild and Moderate Intellectual Disabilities

This study of eyewitness memory questioned children with mild and moderate intellectual disabilities (ID) about a live staged event 1 day later and, again, 2 weeks later. Children with mild ID performed as well as typically-developing children of the same age in response to free recall instructions, and they were just as able as same age peers to resist misleading questions. However, they performed more poorly on general questions, probing for further information after free recall. The children with mild ID also changed their responses to specific questions more often in the repeated interview. The group of children with moderate ID showed markedly lower performance than peers of the same age on nearly every type of eyewitness memory question. Comparisons of the children with ID to mental age-matched peers indicated that performance was similar, although children with ID gave more information in response to free recall instructions and changed their answers in the repeated interview more often. Standardized measures of verbal memory (TOMAL) and suggestibility (Gudjonsson Suggestibility Scale) were modest to moderate predictors of eyewitness memory performance.