EWT: misleading info eval

Question 1

Artificial tasks

Answer 1

ppts had to watch film clips of car accidents. This is different because IRL theres bound to be stress in a real accident. There is evidence that emotion can influence memory. Limitation because such artificial tasks have no meaning and tell us little about misleading questions into real life crimes and accidents. Loftus is too pessimistic about the effects of misleading questions so may not be reliable.

Question 2

Demand Characteristics

Answer 2

Zarogosa and McCloskey argue that many answers ppts give in lab studies of EWT are the result of demand. ppts want to be helpful to researches so when questioned they respond to the ans with yes/no even if they dont know the answer. limitation, it decreases the validity of research studies.

Question 3

Useful real life applications

Answer 3

Loftus believes that leading questions can have distorting effect on memory that police officers need to be careful about how they phrase their questions. Research into EWT can make a positive difference to lives of real people. e.g. improving the way legal system works.

Question 4

Individual differences

Answer 4

Older people are less accurate than younger people. Anastasi and Rhodes found that age groups 18-25 and 35-45 were more accurate than 55-78 year olds. However all age groups were more accurate when identifying people of their own age group (own age bias). Limitation because many researchers have used younger ppts so when identifying people out of their age groups they tend to be less accurate.