Anxiety Flashcards
(21 cards)
What is meant by anxiety?
Anxiety is a strong emotional and psysical state that affects EWT
How does anxiety affect the accuracy of EWT?
Extreme anxiety has been found to negatively affect EWT as witnesses only focus on certain aspects of the event so their recall is limited
What was the aim of Johnson and Scott’s study?
To investigate the effects of anxiety on the accuracy of EWT
What happened in the high anxiety condition in Johnson and Scott’s study?
Weapon focus where ppts heard an argument and the sound of breaking glass from within the room, and a man walked out of the room carrying a knife covered in blood
What happened in the low anxiety condition?
Pts heard the argument from within the room before a man walked out with grease on their hands and a pen
What did ppts then have to do after the two conditions?
Participants then had to identify the person who left the room from 50 photographs
What was the findings in the low anxiety condition?
They correctly identified the man leaving the room 49% of the time
What was the findings in the high anxiety condition?
participants in the high anxiety condition correctly identified the man leaving the room 33% of the time.
What did Johnson and Scott conclude?
Anxiety caused ‘weapon focus’ as the witness concentrates on the weapon not the person because of the fear of the situation, reducing accuracy of eyewitness recall.
Who conducted RTS the negative effect on anxiety?
Valentine and Mesout
What did Valentine and Mesout do?
The researchers used an objective measure (heart rate) to divide the ppts into high and low anxiety groups. Ppts took part in the London Dungeon and were asked to immediately recall physical details of the actor from the event.
What was found in Valentine and Mesout’s study?
It was found that high anxiety lowered the accuracy of EWT significantly.
How does Valentine and Mesout’s research support the findings of Johnson and Scott?
it suggests that high levels of anxiety have a negative effect on immediate eye-witness recall of a stressful event
RTC Johnson and Scott’s research was conducted by
Christianson and Hubinette
What did Christianson and Hubinette do?
They interviewed 58 real life witnesses of a bank robbery where some had been directly threatened and others who where bystanders.
What did Christianson and Hubinette find?
-recall was more than 75% accurate across all witnesses
-those who had been directly threatened had even more accurate accounts.
Why does Christianson and Hubinette’s research contradict Johnson and Scott?
Contradicts because real life cases of those who had high anxiety were able to focus on key aspects of the event and where successful in the perpatrator being caught
What is used to suggest anxiety and the accuracy of EWT is a more complex relationship?
Yerkes Dodson Law
What can both too little and too high anxiety result in?
poor EWT recall
What happens when an optimum level of anxiety is reached?
The accuracy of EWT is high
What can Yerkes Dodson Law be used to explain?
Explains the difference in research findings and validates that anxiety does affect EWT
