Instructing witnesses that a criminal may have changed appearance prior to showing them a lineup has been shown to increase false identifications without increasing correct identifications (S. D. Charman & G. L. Wells, 2007, Is the appearance-change instruction a good idea? Law and Human Behavior, Vol. 31, pp. 3-22). However, the generalizability of the effects of this appearance-change instruction (ACI) is unknown, and there are reasons to believe that the instruction's effects may be moderated by the amount of appearance change the criminal has actually undergone. The current study tested this hypothesis. Undergraduate students (N = 315) were exposed to a series of target faces and lineups, some of which contained the target and some of which did not, and made identification decisions. Half of the participants received a standard ACI prior to each lineup; the other half did not. The targets varied with respect to the amount to which their appearance had changed. Results indicated that the ACI inflated false identifications without inflating correct identifications, and that these effects did not depend on the amount of appearance change the target had undergone. Current recommendations to administer the ACI seem to be unfounded and may be harmful to the reliability of identification evidence.

Mechanistic evidence suggests that arsenic exposure from drinking water increases the production of reactive oxygen species and influences inflammatory responses and endothelial nitric oxide homeostasis. These arsenic-induced events may lead to endothelial dysfunction that increases the risk of atherosclerosis and cardiovascular disease. We reviewed accumulating epidemiologic evidence that evaluated the association between arsenic exposure and intermediate markers and subclinical measures that predict future cardiovascular risk. Cross-sectional studies have indicated positive associations between high or low-to-moderate levels of arsenic exposure with indices of subclinical atherosclerosis, QT interval prolongation, and circulating markers of endothelial dysfunction. The evidence is limited for other intermediate endpoints such as markers of oxidative stress and inflammation, QT dispersion, and lipid profiles. Prospective studies are needed to enhance the causal inferences of arsenic's effects on subclinical endpoints of cardiovascular disease, especially at lower arsenic exposure levels.

Jurors are often asked to evaluate statements provided by young victims, witnesses, and suspects. When, over time, youths' statements contain inconsistent information or recantations of prior statements, jurors face a difficult task in evaluating the validity of the initial claim. The underlying reasons for inconsistencies and recantation of young people's statements, particularly in cases of child sexual abuse, have been debated. Of primary interest here is whether inconsistencies (e.g., recantation) are evaluated differently by fact finders depending on the youth's age and role in a legal case. The current study examined effects of consistency of juvenile statements, legal role, and age on perceptions of testimony in a child sexual abuse investigation. Participants (N = 693) read vignettes describing child sexual abuse in which consistency of a follow-up statement (consistent, inconsistent, recanted), legal role (victim, witness, suspect), and age (10 years, 16 years) of the juvenile providing testimony were manipulated. The results revealed that judgments of initial statement quality, blameworthiness, and guilt were dependent on the consistency of follow-up statements and on the interactive effects of a juvenile's legal role and age. The current study has theoretical implications for understanding juror decision-making and practical implications for legal professionals and fact finders evaluating youths' statements. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Objective: Eyewitness research has generally failed to show an association between eyewitnesses’ pre-identification confidence in their ability to identify the perpetrator from a lineup and their subsequent identification accuracy. However, this observed lack of an association may be an artifact of methodologies in which witnesses experienced homogenous encoding conditions, which would tend to restrict the range of witnesses’ confidence, thereby effectively weakening its relationship with subsequent identification accuracy. The current study examined whether pre-ID confidence is associated with subsequent lineup identification accuracy when there is variability in encoding conditions across witnesses. Hypotheses: We hypothesized (a) that there would be a significant relationship between pre-ID confidence and subsequent lineup identification accuracy across heterogeneous encoding conditions as assessed via calibration and CAC analysis; and (b) that witnesses’ self-reports regarding their underlying memory strength would be at least as predictive of their subsequent lineup identification accuracy as pre-ID confidence. Method: Participant-witnesses (n = 203, Mage = 21.5; 71% Female; 67% Hispanic and/or Latino/a) viewed a mock crime video under varying encoding conditions and were asked to make both a pre-ID confidence assessment and memory strength assessment. After a brief filler task, participants made a lineup identification decision and made a post-ID confidence judgment. This process was then repeated 7 more times (producing 8 identification decisions per participant). Results: Calibration analyses indicated that pre-identification confidence was moderately calibrated with subsequent lineup identification accuracy across witnesses with heterogeneous encoding conditions. Furthermore, confidence-accuracy characteristic curves indicated that memory strength measures obtained from the witness immediately after the witnessed event were also predictive of subsequent identification accuracy. Conclusions: Pre-ID confidence and other memory strength judgments are in fact predictive of identification accuracy under the ecologically valid circumstance that there is variability in encoding across witnesses.