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Outline and Evaluate Research Into the Effects of Anxiety on the Accuracy of Eye Witness Testimony.

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Outline and evaluate research into the effects of anxiety on the accuracy of eye witness testimony. Eye witness testimonies are the evidence given in court or in police investigation by someone who has witnessed a crime or an accident. Eye witness testimonies are affected by a number of factors, but the one that I am going to focus on is anxiety. Laboratory studies and some ‘real life’ studies have generally shown impaired recall in people who have witnessed particularly distressing or anxiety induced situations. The weapon focus effect phenomenon as identified by Loftus 1979, she asked participants to sit outside a laboratory where they thought they were hearing a genuine exchange between people inside the laboratory. In the…show more content…
They found that the people which had been subject to the greater level of anxiety (the victims) showed more detailed recall than the bystanders, therefore criticising Loftus 1975 as they found that a higher level of intermediate anxiety improves the accuracy of recall, whereas Loftus found that participants which were subject to low levels of anxiety had improved recall of recognising the man in the amicable discussion. A ‘law’ first proposed by Yerkes and
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