Accuracy Of Eyewitness Testimony

Eyewitness evidence has always been considering critical information when it comes to court trials and convictions. But how reliable are eyewitnesses? Scientific research has shown that eyewitness’s memories are often not accurate or reliable. Human memory is very malleable and is easily changed by suggestion. Relying on eyewitness evidence instead of scientific data often leads to wrongful convictions. Scientific evidence is much more reliable, and should be more important in court cases than eyewitness evidence.

Eyewitness testimony has long been viewed as important evidence in court cases. The general population believes eyewitness identification more than any other evidence, even if the witness account is conflicting with the other evidence presented. Studies show that eyewitness testimony is unreliable, and yet it is still considered the most important form of evidence. People think that if a person says they saw something then it must have happened. Currently there are no universal guidelines on how to obtain and present such evidence. The purpose of this paper is to explain why eyewitness testimony is unreliable, and discuss the proposed guidelines on how law enforcement agencies should gather identifications, as well how

The reliability if an eyewitness testimony is questionable. The witness may be so certain that the person that thy are pointing out is one hundred per cent the suspect or they could be so certain when it comes to retelling the incident, although these people are so sure on what it is they are doing, their testimony cannot always accurate. Due to the lack of accuracy with eyewitness

An eyewitness testimony is unreliable because of many different things. Sometimes when witnesses see something they don’t see the whole crime, but only parts which could cause the wrong people to be in trouble. When it’s a serious crime the trial could take years and when asked to stand trial against the perpetrator the witness’s memory could not be fully correct anymore. You could forget important things or get mixed up with things you’ve seen somewhere else, like in a movie. Another reason they are unreliable is Because individuals with certain psychological disorders, like antisocial personality disorder and substance dependence, are at high risk for criminal involvement, they are also at high risk for false identifications by eyewitnesses.

While the cognitive interview does prove to be effective in increasing the amount of accurate information elicited from witnesses of crimes, it does not necessarily increase the credibility of eyewitness testimony by reducing memory error and confabulations. The cognitive interview has been shown to elicit more information than the standard interview, but the two types do not differ on incorrect information or confabulations

When it comes to critiquing how the identification information was obtained, several things are considered unreliable. The first mistake of the use of eyewitness testimonies in the Thompson & Cotton case was Jennifer was in a state of shock when identifying her assailant. Jennifer was in a deep slumber as a stranger at knifepoint awakened her causing adrenaline rush and high stress as she was fearing for her life. “My body was terrified although my mind hadn’t caught up yet” (Cannino et al. 12). This type of state of mind causes the brain to cloud its judgment when high stress occurs during the process of identifying a criminal. Although, Jennifer was able to study her attacker to the best ability possible, stress can alter the memory process clouding exact description especially held at knifepoint.

In Canada, the leading cause of wrongful conviction is due to the factor of eyewitness account. It has been proven that individual’s minds are not like tape recorders because everyone cannot precisely and accurately remember the description of what another person or object looks like. The courts looks at eyewitness accounts as a great factor to nab perpetrators because they believe that the witness should know what they are taking about and seen what occurred on the crime scene. On the other hand, eyewitness accounts lead to a 70 percent chance of wrongful conviction, where witnesses would substantially change their description of a perpetrator.

The impact of eyewitness testimony upon the members of a jury has been the subject of various research projects and has guided the policies formed by the federal government regarding its competent use in criminal matters (Wells, Malpass, Lindsay, Fisher, Turtle, & Fulero, 2000). Therefore, eyewitness studies are important to understand how

There are many different factors that play a part in the increased chance of a witness correctly identifying a suspect. Such factors should be brought to the attention of the jury and the judge to help in properly assessing whether a witness is correctly identifying a suspect. A study by Magnussen, Melinder, Stridbeck, & Raja (2010) found that of the three different types of people: judge, jury, and general public, that for the most part all where fairly ill-informed on the reliability of eyewitness testimony with judges having the most. Judges only had about an 8% difference in knowledge when compared to jurors. With this information it is very clear that education on the reliability of eyewitness testimony needs to become more of a general knowledge information for the everyone, especially people who are involved in upholding the law. Another factor to look into when evaluating the accuracy eyewitness testimony is the role that memory plays. Memory is divided into three processes: perceiving, remembering, and recalling information (Simmonsen, 2013). There is plenty of room in all three of those stages to forget or falsely remember something. Some factors that play a part when a person perceives an event is the amount of time they are exposed to the event and the suspect. A study conducted by Horry, Halford, Brewer, Milne, & Bull. (2014) found that witnesses were increasingly more likely to correctly identify a suspect if they had been exposed to the suspect for sixty

Researcher Elizabeth Loftus, encapsulated the reliability of human memory and the notion about the inaccuracy of eyewitness accounts. She hypothesized that if eyewitnesses are asked questions with false presuppositions, the erroneous information will be incorporated into the witness’s memory and alter the memory of the witnessed event.

Eyewitness identification and testimony play a huge role in the criminal justice system today, but skepticism of eyewitnesses has been growing. Forensic evidence has been used to undermine the reliability of eyewitness testimony, and the leading cause of false convictions in the United States is due to misidentifications by eyewitnesses. The role of eyewitness testimony in producing false confessions and the factors that contribute to the unreliability of these eyewitness testimonies are sending innocent people to prison, and changes are being made in order to reform these faulty identification procedures.

2. There are many ways that improvement can be made in questioning of victims and eyewitnesses. The line of questioning should be slowed down so that the memory can accurately recall the stored information. The police can help set the stage to recreate original information to help the victims and eyewitnesses remember the environment. Questions should fit the witness or victim. The victim or witness should be the center of the interview not the other way around. Police should respect when an answer is incorrect and have some sensitivity. The final improvement that can be made is not to judge prematurely the victim or eyewitness.

Whenever a crime takes place, eyewitnesses who are present on the scene can help the police or authorities when the crime is being investigated. However, eyewitness memory can be affected by a series of factors.

The study was conducted to show how altering certain words can influence to the accuracy of eyewitness testimony. The study consisted of two experiments. The first was done on 45 participants who were split into groups of varying sizes and they were shown seven films. In the first study, the independent variable was the verb used in the critical question. These were either, 'hit ', 'bumped ', 'smashed ', 'contacted ' and 'collided '. And the dependent variable was the speed estimation the participant gave. Loftus and Palmer found that the verb 'smashed ' lead to a higher estimated speed when compared to 'contacted '. Their findings were significant at p < 00.5 level. The second experiment was conducted to help the

Eye-Witness Testimony Until now we have focused upon theoretical psychology that employ methods that are removed from real life. Neisser was one psychologist who criticized his fellow psychologists for concentrating too much on theoretical concepts and ignoring the practical issues involved about memory. It is memory from real life experiences that psychologists must concentrate on and one aspect of this is known as the eyewitness testimony. Reliability of Eyewitness Testimony -----------------------------------