A woman is being questioned by a police officer about a heated argument she witnessed on an evening out with friends. The argument took
place in a bar and ended with a violent assault. A knife was discovered later by police in the car park of the bar. ‘Did you see the knife the
attacker was holding?’, asked the police officer. ‘I’m not sure there was a knife – yes, there probably was,’ replied the woman. ‘I was so
scared at the time that it’s hard to remember, and my friends and I have talked about what happened so many times since that I’m almost
not sure what I did see.’
Discuss research into two or more factors that affect the reliability of eyewitness testimony. Refer to the information above in your
answer. [16 marks]
A01:
EWT is the ability of people to accurately remember details of events they’ve observed. Two key factors that
affect the reliability of eye witness testimony are misleading information- specifically leading questions and
anxiety.
For example, leading questions are explained by the study from Loftus and Palmer (1974):
aim: demonstrated memory can be deliberately distorted by changing a verb in a question
method: 45 participants, watched clip of 2 cars in accident, completed questionnaire after watching clip
participants placed in 1 of 5 groups:
Group 1 Group 2 Group 3 Group 4 Group 5
Hit Contacted Bumped Collided Smashed
findings: group 2 estimated lowest - mean of 31.8mph
group 5 estimated highest - mean of 40.5mph
conclusion: leading questions do affect EWT as a result of the type of word used
A02:
This links to the extract as the officer uses a leading question when he asks ‘did you see the knife’, the use of ‘the’
leads the woman on to thinking that there was a knife even though she wasn't originally sure, this shows that the
officers use of words impacted her judgement as she replied with ‘probably’
A03:
-study lacks population validity, the sample consisted of an all male American sample, unable to generalise
results to a wider population which reduces validity
+practical application, law enforcement need to stop using leading questions to increase reliability of their
interviews as leading questions can lead to inaccurate recall, increases usefulness in society
A01:
place in a bar and ended with a violent assault. A knife was discovered later by police in the car park of the bar. ‘Did you see the knife the
attacker was holding?’, asked the police officer. ‘I’m not sure there was a knife – yes, there probably was,’ replied the woman. ‘I was so
scared at the time that it’s hard to remember, and my friends and I have talked about what happened so many times since that I’m almost
not sure what I did see.’
Discuss research into two or more factors that affect the reliability of eyewitness testimony. Refer to the information above in your
answer. [16 marks]
A01:
EWT is the ability of people to accurately remember details of events they’ve observed. Two key factors that
affect the reliability of eye witness testimony are misleading information- specifically leading questions and
anxiety.
For example, leading questions are explained by the study from Loftus and Palmer (1974):
aim: demonstrated memory can be deliberately distorted by changing a verb in a question
method: 45 participants, watched clip of 2 cars in accident, completed questionnaire after watching clip
participants placed in 1 of 5 groups:
Group 1 Group 2 Group 3 Group 4 Group 5
Hit Contacted Bumped Collided Smashed
findings: group 2 estimated lowest - mean of 31.8mph
group 5 estimated highest - mean of 40.5mph
conclusion: leading questions do affect EWT as a result of the type of word used
A02:
This links to the extract as the officer uses a leading question when he asks ‘did you see the knife’, the use of ‘the’
leads the woman on to thinking that there was a knife even though she wasn't originally sure, this shows that the
officers use of words impacted her judgement as she replied with ‘probably’
A03:
-study lacks population validity, the sample consisted of an all male American sample, unable to generalise
results to a wider population which reduces validity
+practical application, law enforcement need to stop using leading questions to increase reliability of their
interviews as leading questions can lead to inaccurate recall, increases usefulness in society
A01:
