Ch 15: Social Psych in Court

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Ch 15 Social Psych in Court

• Part 1 Apr 25, 2006

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Eyewitness Testimony

• Beth Loftus research on accuracy of
  eyewitnesses
• People are convinced by it, buthow accurate are
  they?
• Examples of research
• Eyewitnesses usually more confident than they are
  correct

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Misinformation Effect

• Loftus shows students slides of car accident.
• Car is at stop/yield signlater students asked
  about opposite sign
• How often do students mis-remember?
• misinfo from suggestive question put into memory

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Why the Misinfo Effect?

• Misleading questions cause problem with source
  monitoring
• What is it?
• Problem when witness confused about why a face
  looks familiar
• OK City bombing 3rd suspect sought for a while,
  what happened?

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Reducing Eyewitness Error

• Gary Wells developed the cognitive interview
  technique
• Includes 4 main components
• 1)
• 2)
• 3)
• 4)

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Errors in Line-ups

• Look at lineup with suspect/foils
• Wells research on lineup composition problems
  include
• 1) fillers
• 2) instructions
• 3) influence of investigators
• 4) confidence of witnesses
• How can each be resolved?

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Line-ups

• Sequential v. Simultaneous lineups
• How do they differ and which is best?
• Present witnesses with photos and voice
  recordings
• Educate jurors use of lineup experts (social
  psych) more common in trials

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Judging Witness Accuracy

• Differences in how accurate v. inaccurate
  witnesses describe how they identified a culprit
  -
• Trying to put facial image into words can reduce
  accuracy (Schooler study)

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Detecting Deception

• Who is best at this?
• Ekman experiment with groups of CIA officers,
  clinical psychologists, others.
• Results?
• Polygraphs? Assume when people lie, they become
  anxious.
• Guilty knowledge test what is it and how can it
  be used?