Factors Affecting Eye Witness Testimony: Anxiety

Question 1

How does anxiety affect EWT

Answer 1

It can have positive and negative affects

Question 2

What is anxiety’s negative effect on recall

Answer 2

Causes physical arousal which prevents us from paying attention

Question 3

What is weapons focus theory and who developed it

Answer 3

Johnson and Scott
Focus on the weapon creates anxiety and it is all we focus on

Question 4

What was Johnson and Scott’s research

Answer 4

Weapon focus
Has participants sit in a waiting room. One group heard a conversation and saw a man walk past with a pen and grease in his hands. Theo other saw blood and a knife.
49% could recall the man with the or. But only 33% the man with the knife

Question 5

How can anxiety have a positive affect on recall

Answer 5

Triggers fight or fight response which increases alertness

Question 6

Who researched anxiety and its positive effects

Answer 6

Yuille and cutshall
Based on a shooting
Asked people to recall the events and also measure stress levels on a 7 point scale
Those who were more stressed recalled more - anxiety can enhance memory

Question 7

What is the yerkes dodson law

Answer 7

Anxiety increases recall up to a certain point before it drastically decreases it
(Like a curve on a graph)

Question 8

What is a limitation of Johnson and Scot’s research

Answer 8

May not have restarted anxiety. The knife caused surprise not anxiety

Pickel found that when hairdressers held items like a chicken, gun, wallet, etc, people mostly remembered the chicken as its unusual

Question 9

What is a strength of the negative effects of anxiety

Answer 9

Supporting evidence
Valentine and mesout- London dungeon