Eye Witness Testimony

As we take a look into the factors that justify whether or not eyewitness testimony is a valid, recognized method of exclusively convicting an individual of a crime from the defensive perspective, because yes I've chosen a side we will consider how the cognitive processes of perception, attention and memory influence accuracy. The visuospatial sketch pad is out focal platform that describes both visual and spatial cognitive processes as they relate to comprehending information. We begin with the incident environment, episodic and semantic components that will help us to conclude eyewitness testimony alone is not sufficient enough to make an obsolete conclusion to convict someone of a crime.

“You are probably not able to remember every single word contained in the opening paragraph you just read, however the basic points made in the opening paragraph may have been retained.”.(Yoder 2006). Needless to say you read every single word in that paragraph. Due to encoding and the way our minds retain and process information it is virtually impossible to distinctively conclude through a course of events that transpired without footage of said event to make a justified determination. When you account for a person’s retrieval process of information you can rely on mere attention, perception and memory. “For instance, psychologists need to test how accurately you can retrieve information in order to determine who accurately stored that information. (Hintzman, 2011) Since ladies and gentlemen of the jury we are not licensed psychologists, how can we determine what the motivating factors of an eye witness are, whether or not their agenda or motives are pure, if there are incentives or personal interests involved intentionally or unintentionally. Wait, it gets better to be fair you even have to take in account as the writer of this paper what my personal motivation is as well. Plainly, there is a lot of information to consider.

Let's simply move into perception which can be biased. Emotional discomfort can impair reasoning and allow an individual to quickly forget information that contradicts their own beliefs through selective perception. It can be manipulated by something as trivial as favoritism or as complex as unintentional bias. Explaining the foundational purpose of forensic investigations of scientific truths that can be virtually impossible to dispute like a random drug test. Organization, identification and interpretation of sensory information shows how we interpret our environment, circumstances or situation.

As an individual directs their mind to listen, see, understand or notice something we have to account for the time it takes to process, store and relay that information from the time investigated and compare that to the time of the actual incident. Depending on the time frame of actual occurrence to the time of interrogation a number of factors could have changed. The levels of processing approach show an accurate method in recalling long term information by the depth of processing and emotional connection to said incident or occurrence.

Memory involves details that associate with stimuli and general materials called self- reliance. Using distinctiveness, elaboration and meta analysis a person can determine things at a greater rate. Whether or not a person believes what they are attesting to has little or no impact on the accuracy of a person's memory. “In one study, Foley conducted (1999) shows that cognitive processes are active people transform their thoughts according to what is occurring. If there was a rape and the detective was interrogating a witness for a statement that witness could be influenced to transform her statement to influence the outcome the detective is out to prove. Being confident that a person saw or encountered something alone is not a sure indicator as to what actually transpired. Cues from “self – reliance link with information that a person is trying to learn. Your trait of honesty seems different than your trait of intelligence. (Hoyt, 1993). Another factor one could consider rehearsed information is manipulated. Researchers need to look at the variables that's going on in a person's head before they can trust an eyewitness statement. Even when schemas are used we still forget the information that isn't consistent with what we want to remember. In plain people remember what they want to suit their purpose with a consistency bias.(Brewer, 2003) Memory schemas can alter a witness testimony when they believe the witness on an event when something entirely different occurred because of faulty source monitoring. More importantly source monitoring gives the distinctive validation needed to help you draw the conclusions needed to make a sound decision on what you choose to believe. Checking the accuracy of information that has been reported even by an eye witness should be your goal. Reality monitoring enables you to realize if such occurrences truly occurred. Furthermore, inaccuracies developed from misleading information given by confident eye witnesses. In post event misinformation effect because of proactive interference or retroactive interference.

P.Yoder.2006. Memory and Aging.: Current Issues and Future Directions. Psychology Press.Florence.Kentucky.

D.HIintzman.2011.How does repetition affect memory.Univeristy of Oregon.

Foley, 1999. The handbook of evolutionary psychology.Vol.1 : Foundation.

I.P,Hoyt.1993 Disassociated Disorders. University of Wisconsin. New York. Plenum