Misleading Information

Question 1

What is research on misleading information?

Answer 1

• Loftus and Palmer (1974) made 45 participants watch car accident and were aksed how fast the car was going when the cars (hit, contacted, smashed)
• mean estimate of speed was 31.8mph for contacted and 40.5 mph when smashed
  They did another experiment where they asked the participants if there was broken glass, if in smashed group they were more likely to say yes

Question 2

What is research on post event discussion?

Answer 2

• Gabbert et al (2003) studied participants in pairs, they each watched a crime scene from different POVs and then they discussed what they saw
• researchers found that 71% of participants mistakenly recalled aspects that they didn’t see and in a control group this was 0%
• witnesses go along with each other for social approval or because they think they are wrong

Question 3

What’s a strength of misleading information?

Answer 3

• Strength that it has important practical uses in criminal justice system, makes police be very careful with how they phrase questions so it’s not misleading

Question 4

What’s 2 limitations of misleading questions?

Answer 4

• Limtation that memory conformity is evidence that PED actually alters EWT - memory itself is distorted through contamination by misleading PED rather than result of conformity
• Limitation that lab studies have said misleading information is a cause of inaccurate EWT but McCloskey said it was due to demand characteristics