1. The reliability of one cognitive process
Eye Witness Testimony

2. Does this man remind you of anyone you know?

3. In 1987, due to witness reports, Anthony Capozzi was convicted of raping two women. He was sentenced to 35 years in prison.
Twenty years later, biological evidence, stored in a hospital drawer, was discovered and proved his innonence. He was exonerated and released in April 2007.

4. What is eye witness testimony?
Evidence supplied by people who witness a specific event or crime, relying only on their memory.
Statements often include
descriptions of the criminal (facial appearance, clothing, other identifiable characteristics)
details of the crime scene, (e.g. the sequence of events, time of day, presence of other witnesses)
The witness may later be required to make an identification

5. Accuracy of EWT
There is good evidence that EWT can be incorrect, because memories of events tends to be fragile and easily distorted, (e.g. by leading questions).
People do not always have total recall for the event and fill in the gaps on the basis of what they think might have happened.
This is called reconstructive memory.

6. Reconstructive memory
An active process where information of the to-be-remembered information and information from our knowledge and experience of the world becomes combined.
Knowledge and experience of the world is organised into schema, integrated ‘packets’ of information on a certain theme; schema help us to make sense of the world around us; stored in LTM; top down processing
Our recall of actual events can be shaped or distorted by the competing information in our associated schema.

7. 5 ways schema can affect recall
Cohen (1993)
Ignore aspects that do not fit with currently activated schema
Store central features of an event without need to store exact details
Make sense of events with plausible explanations/alternatives
Distort memories to fit in with expectations
‘Fill in the gaps’ - invent information and make best guesses when memory fails both consciously and unconsciously

8. Watch this!

9. Demonstration experiment