SummaryAcute alcohol intoxication during encoding can impair subsequent identification accuracy, but results across studies have been inconsistent, with studies often finding no effect. Little is also known about how alcohol intoxication affects the identification confidence–accuracy relationship. We randomly assigned women (N = 153) to consume alcohol (dosed to achieve a 0.08% blood alcohol content) or tonic water, controlling for alcohol expectancy. Women then participated in an interactive hypothetical sexual assault scenario and, 24 hours or 7 days later, attempted to identify the assailant from a perpetrator present or a perpetrator absent simultaneous line‐up and reported their decision confidence. Overall, levels of identification accuracy were similar across the alcohol and tonic water groups. However, women who had consumed tonic water as opposed to alcohol identified the assailant with higher confidence on average. Further, calibration analyses suggested that confidence is predictive of accuracy regardless of alcohol consumption. The theoretical and applied implications of our results are discussed.© 2017 The Authors Applied Cognitive Psychology Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
Summary We experimentally examined the effects of alcohol consumption and exposure to misleading postevent information on memory for a hypothetical interactive rape scenario. We used a 2 beverage (alcohol vs. tonic water) × 2 expectancy (told alcohol vs. told tonic) factorial design. Participants (N = 80) were randomly assigned to conditions. They consumed alcohol (mean blood alcohol content = 0.06%) or tonic water before engaging in the scenario. Alcohol expectancy was controlled by telling participants they were consuming alcohol or tonic water alone, irrespective of the actual beverage they were consuming. Approximately a week later, participants were exposed to a misleading postevent narrative and then recalled the scenario and took a recognition test. Participants who were told that they had consumed alcohol rather than tonic reported fewer correct details, but they were no more likely to report incorrect or misleading information. The confidence–accuracy relationship for control and misled items was similar across groups, and there was some evidence that metacognitive discrimination was better for participants who were told that they had consumed alcohol compared with those told they had tonic water. Implications for interviewing rape victims are discussed.
We examined how encoding view influences the information that is stored in and retrieved from memory during an eyewitness identification task. Participants watched a mock crime and we varied the angle from which they viewed the perpetrator. In Experiment 1, participants (N = 2904) were tested with a static photo lineup; the viewing angle of the lineup members was the same or different from the perpetrator at encoding. In Experiment 2, participants (N = 1430) were tested with a novel interactive lineup in which they could rotate the lineup faces into any angle. In both experiments, discrimination accuracy was greater when the viewing angle at encoding and test matched. Participants reinstated the angle of the interactive faces to match their encoding angle. Our results highlight the importance of encoding specificity for eyewitness identification, and show that people actively seek out information in the testing environment that matches the study environment to aid memory retrieval.
Configural processing supports accurate face recognition, yet it has never been examined within the context of criminal identification lineups. We tested, using the inversion paradigm, the role of configural processing in lineups. Recent research has found that face discrimination accuracy in lineups is better in a simultaneous compared to a sequential lineup procedure. Therefore, we compared configural processing in simultaneous and sequential lineups to examine whether there are differences. We had participants view a crime video, and then they attempted to identify the perpetrator from a simultaneous or sequential lineup. The test faces were presented either upright or inverted, as previous research has shown that inverting test faces disrupts configural processing.The size of the inversion effect for faces was the same across lineup procedures, indicating that configural processing underlies face recognition in both procedures. Discrimination accuracy was comparable across lineup procedures in both the upright and inversion condition. Theoretical implications of the results are discussed.
Recently, the field of eyewitness identification has undergone a radical transformation, using signal-detection theory, models, and associated analyses to answer the important applied question of how police should test a witness’s memory of a criminal perpetrator. Here, we used these analytical techniques and the basic science of face memory to examine how encoding view influences the information that is stored in and retrieved from memory during an eyewitness identification task. Participants watched a simulated crime and we varied the angle from which they viewed the perpetrator. In Experiment 1, participants (N=2,904) were tested with a static photo lineup; the viewing angle of the lineup members was the same or different from the perpetrator at encoding. In Experiment 2, participants (N=1,430) were tested with a novel interactive lineup in which they could rotate the lineup faces into any angle. In both experiments, discrimination accuracy was greater when the viewing angle at encoding and test matched. Interestingly, participants also naturally reinstated the angle of the interactive faces to match their encoding angle. Our results highlight the importance of encoding specificity for eyewitness identification, and reveal that people actively seek out information in the testing environment that matches the study environment to aid memory retrieval. Our study demonstrates how memory findings and analytical techniques from the basic science literature can enhance our understanding of applied eyewitness memory processes, and ultimately reduce memory errors that can have devastating consequences in the real world.
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