PSY325 Final Exam Research

Fraser (2011)

2 groups A: David Bain shot his family B: David's father shot the family audio clip at 7 different points perception significantly influenced by what they had been told

Loftus & Zanni (1975)

indefinite article (did you see a broken headlight) vs. definite article (did you see the broken headlight) people 2x more likely to say yes when definite article used considerable effort gone into identifying alternative questioning techniques to help witnesses to give more complete and accurate testimony this research is especially important for child witnesses who generally report very little free recall info and can be highly suggestible "gold standard"--> increase amount of info without compromising accuracy

Correll, Park, Judd, & Wittenbank (2002)

computer simulation--> shoot only targets holding weapons more likely to shoot unarmed black people than unarmed white people police officers showed this bias as well

Cowen et al. 1984

2 hour murder trial shown to 288 eligible jurors jurors categorized into qualified or excludable juries formed either qualified or a mix of both assessed verdicts qualified jury significantly more likely to convict than the mixed juries mixed juries took a more serious approach to their deliberation tasks, were more critical of eyewitness testimony, and were better able to remember the evidence

Dror, Peron, Hind, & Charlton (2005)

27 people asked to say if two fingerprints matched (96 trials each) manipulated task difficulty: non/ambiguous or ambiguous manipulated contextual info: control, low emotion, high emotion, high emotion + subliminal • No effect of contextual manipulations when the task was non-ambiguous. task was ambiguous, those in the 'high emotion' condition and the 'high emotion + subliminal' condition were more likely to find a match. Contextual information actively biases the way gaps are filled, but was not sufficient to override clear bottom-up information"

Loftus & Banaji (1989)

4 minute videotape of robbery and shooting exposed to tv report of the incident with misinformation or no misinformation asked to evaluate news presenter memory for videotape tested 1/3 of misinformed participants incorporated the misinformation into their subsequent memory reports control participants reports were highly accurate

Garven, Wood, Malpass, & Shaw, 1998)

5 problematic techniques in the McMartin preschool case suggestive questions referring to other people positive and negative consequences asked and answered inviting speculation 3-6 year olds Manny compared the use of bad techniques with just suggestive techniques yes answers to misleading questions were much higher for the bad ones--> lots of false allegations--> yes answers increased over the itnerview

Sternberg, Lamb, Hershkowitz, et al. (1997)

51 investigative interviews with child complaints of sexual abuse (age 4-12) style of rapport building phase manipulated (open-ended or direct) children in open ended uttered 2x as many words and 2x as many details

Devine et al. (2001)

7 or fewer jurors favor conviction at the beginning of deliberations--> probably acquit 10+ favor conviction at beginning--> probably convict 8 or 9--> final verdict is a toss up

Zajac and Karageorge (2009)

8-11 years old went to police station confederate event varied lineup (TA or TP) wild card or control wild card increased children's performance in TA lineup wild card did not affect children's performance in TP lineup wild card conditions, TA and TP accuracy rates did not differ

(Patterson & Kemp, 2005)

Cowitness discussion: Advantage: may prompt witnesses to recall forgotten details can reinforce memory can aid recovery from trauma can paint a more accurate overall picture Disadvantage: can contaminate independent recollection can weaken prosecution case witness may become unsure of their testimony can lead to reports of "common things" collusions

Osborne & Zajac (2015)

Dror and colleagues always presented their blocks in the same order (i.e., control, low emotion, high emotion, high emotion + subliminal) to avoid contamination of emotional context between blocks. So, couldn't their findings just mean that people made more matches on ambiguous stimuli as the experiment progressed, regardless of emotional context? Repeated Dror et al.'s experiment with a sample of 200 undergraduate students. Half of the participants were presented with increasing emotional context on each block, just as Dror and colleagues did (red bars). The other half of participants (blue bars) received NO contextual information in any of the blocks. Results suggested that Dror and colleagues' findings were due to emotional context, rather than people merely making more matches over time. Subsequent preliminary research has revealed that emotion per se is not the driving force behind these findings - no effect is observed when we use highly emotional pictures that are not crime-related (e.g., photos of victims of natural disasters).

Lynch & Haney (2000)

Potential jurors either presented with a description of a black defendant/white victim murder case, or a white defendant/black victim murder case presented with death penalty instructions assessed verdicts comprehension of verdicts assessed comprehension of instructions high: race has no effect on if death was recommended or not comprehension low: race plays a significant role in decision making--> black defendant who murdered a white victim= 2x as likely to get death penalty

Phillips et al., 1999

TA lineups single blind condition: investigator is aware of suspect's position in lineup -results in much more selection of TA double blind: neither know -safeguards against increased false identifications due to investigator knowing suspect

Ziesel & Diamond (1978)

are jurors dismissed during juror selection any more or less likely to convict? examined juror votes in 12 criminal trials persuaded dismissed jurors to stay in court and observe the case overall, lawyers are not much better than chance at selecting jurors who will return the right verdict defence lawyers tend to be better than prosecution lawyers a substantial degree of individual variation in lawyers' success rates

Clark & Tunnicliff (2001)

asked to give verbal description of perpetrator 3 lineups: TP: description-matched foils TA: description-matched foils TA: suspect-matched foils not a huge difference in accuracy but a HUGE difference in inaccuracy

Snyder & Uranowitz (1978)

case history on "Betty K" immediately or 1 week later--> told betty k was homosexual or heterosexual one group told nothing memory for case history was then assessed delay did not exert effect on the responses participants made more label-consistent errors than label-inconsistent errors

McCloskey & Zaragoza (1985)

changed a test instead of presenting participants with a choice between correct item and misinformation item, researchers presented them with a choice between the correct item and a novel item

Jack, Martyn, & Zajac (2015)

children, adolescents, and adults sohwn film of a simulated crime 15 min. later asked to give free recall account of what happened then asked to recall again and assigned to one of four conditions: own sketch provided sketch photograph no visual aid regardless of age, visual aids increased amount of info that participants provided visual aids increased the proportion of accurate info provided visual aids decreased the proportion of subjective info reported by participants of all ages and reduced proportion of errors made by children

Zajac & Hayne, 2003) in the lab

cross involved trying to talk children out of each of their direct examination responses regardless of accuracy--> done using questioning techniques commonly used in courtrooms 85% of children made at least one change to earlier testimony during the cross 33% changed ALL of their earlier responses response changes were made irrespective of accuracy overall: cross significantly decreased children's accuracy even for children who started out with 100% accurate accounts

Assefi & Garry (2003)

drank tonic water but half told it was alcohol took part in standard misinformation procedure people from "alcohol" group were more susceptible to misleading post event info encoding did not differ between the 2 groups

Steblay et al. 1999

factors that increase PTP effects worse in serious crimes multiple negative points in the ptp increased length between the ptp and trial emotional ptp (was horrible...) ptp from tv all lead to an increase in guilty verdicts

Memon, Hope, & Gabbert (2002)

given post lineup questionnaire 90% expected target to be present despite clear instructions 95% recalled instructions 47% of incorrect witnesses would make the same decision in real life

Davis, Lopez, Koyama, et al. (2005)

listen to argument between a couple half told they broke up half told the woman was found dead and the bf charged with murder memory for conversation was assessed--> participants in the murder condition: more likely to accurately remember that the man had made threatening statements towards the girl AND more likely to inaccurately recall that he had hit her and that he had threatened to harm her classmate

Paterson & Kemp (2006)

many crimes involve more than one eyewitness 86% of witnesses engage in co-witness discussion witnesses say the purpose is to provide info--> but courts want independent recollection of the individual witness

Steblay et al. (1999)

meta analysis 44 PTP studies involving 5755 participants participants exposed to negative PTP were more likely to judge the defendant guilty than participants exposed to less or no negative PTP PTP=pre trial publicity

Gabbert, Memon, & Allan (2003)

pairs of participants watched a simulated crime each watched a slightly different video (without knowing that) half of participants were allowed to discuss the video before being individually interviewed 71% of the discussion group reported items that they had not seen none of the participants in the control reported unseen items 60% of participants who had not seen the theft declared the girl guilty of stealing after discussing the video with a co-witness who saw the theft

Efran (1974)

part 1: 108 students answered the following 2 questions on a 6-point likert scale 1. should jurors be influenced by defendant's character and previous history? 77% say yes 2. should jurors be influenced by defendant's attractiveness? 7% said yes part 2: 66 students in a simulated jury experiment case study of a student caught cheating in an exam attractive photo, less attractive, no photo participants asked to rate defendant attractiveness, likelihood of guilt, and punishment severity attractive defendants considered less guilty and given less severe punishments than unattractive defendants no photo: ratings were midway between the two EXCEPTION: attractiveness helped a person commit the crime (sexual assault, swindling old people)

Payne (2001)

participants primed with black or white face black face: were quicker to categorize weapons -more likely to mistakenly identify tools as weapons white face: reverse

Darby & Jeffers (1988)

read and evaluated 3 judicial cases defendant attractiveness was manipulated (H, M, L) asked to make judgments of guilty, punishment severity, and attractiveness of defendant asked to complete a self-assessment questionnaire both juror groups--> guilty convictions increased as defendant attractiveness decreased attractive jurors more likely to convict attractive jurors: punishment severity increased as defendant attractiveness decreased unattractive jurors: high attractive and low attractive defendants were given lower sentences than medium attractive defendants

Shepherd and Ellis (1996)

recognizable features Hair eyes/nose face shape Environmental factors: light, seriousness of crime, weapon presence Post-Event factors: delay, misinformation, verbal overshadowing (verbally describing a face impairs your ability to recognize that face)

Zajac, Gross, & Hayne (2003)

response to cross examination (children) high rate of compliance with leading questions low rates of clarification seeking: wouldn't ask for clarification misunderstandings during cross--> 75% of children made at least one change to their earlier testimony

Loftus & Palmer (1974)

saw automobile accident answered questions about film immediately afterwards manipulation= wording of the questions subjects' estimates of speed were dependent on the question qording assessed reporting of broken glass at the accident scene reporting of broken glass was related to the wording of the speed estimate question

Loftus and Burns (1982)

showed movie of bank robbery with violent or non-violent ending violent version: poorer memories for detail seen immediately before the violence disruption of memory consolidation?

Allport (1947)

showed photos of a shabbily dressed white man holding a razor and arguing with an unarmed well dressed black man in retellings, over half of participants transposed the character

Loftus, Loftus, & Messo (1987)

slides of customer pulling out check book or handgun made more correct identifications when no weapon present made more and longer eye fixations on the gun than the check book witnesses eyes drawn to weapons even in harmless situations

Pickel (1999)

slides of target dressed as policeman or a priest carrying either a gun or phone witnesses less accurate about the priest when he carried a gun memory accuracy for policeman did not differ according to the prop that he carried

Wessel & Merkelbach (1997)

spider exposes to people with and without phobias memory for central events did not differ between groups phobic participants scored lower when asked about peripheral details

Leippe, Wells, & Ostrom (1978)

staged theft in front of students expensive item or trivial eyewitnesses made more accurate identifications when the crime was perceived as more serious were results due to increased encoding? -manipulated whether or not value of the expensive item was known at the time of the "robbery" knowledge gained after the robbery--> effect was not observed -when you think something is more important you pay more attention and encode it more (must know value at time of occurence)

Wells et al. (2000)

suggested foils should be chosen based on witnesses verbal description

Fitzgerald and Ellsworth (1984)

survey 811 eligible jurors 64% support death penalty 17% never impose death penalty asked about justice system more likely to favor prosecutions viewpoint more likely to mistrust criminal defendants more in favor of punitive approaches toward offenders more concerned with crime control than due process