No evidence that alcohol intoxication impairs judgments of learning in face recognition

Abstract

Alcohol use is frequently involved in crime, making it crucial to understand the role of alcohol in facial recognition to maximize correct perpetrator identifications. Although the majority of the alcohol and face recognition research has investigated recognition with retrospective confidence judgments, we examined the effects of alcohol intoxication on face recognition with prospective metacognitive judgments. Participants (N = 54 university students without a history of hazardous alcohol/substance use) consumed either alcohol (mean breath alcohol concentration of 0.06 at pretest and 0.07 at post-test) or a non-alcoholic placebo drink. Participants then studied unfamiliar male and female faces and made judgments of learning (JOLs) for each face (i.e., predicted the likelihood of recognizing that face on a future memory test). After a brief distractor task, participants completed an old-new recognition test on which they attempted to distinguish the studied faces from new faces. It was found that the alcohol manipulation had minimal effect on face recognition performance or judgments of learning. Our results suggest that theory-based cues about the effects of alcohol might play a greater role in retrospective judgments than prospective judgments. Although not a primary focus of the study, face recognition was better for male faces than female faces, and this occurred for both female and male participants.Limitations and implications of the research are discussed.

And one more for the road: Commentary on the Special Issue on alcohol and eyewitness memory

“…They tested 54 participants, but, to find a medium‐sized effect ( d = 0.50) in a between‐subjects design with standard levels for alpha and beta, one would need to test at least 128 participants. This observation is not a criticism on Monds et al (); we understand the difficulties in recruiting large numbers of participants for these kind of studies. They are expensive to conduct, researchers only have limited time available for data collection, and the exclusion and drop‐out rates are high.…”

“…However, the study of Monds et al () and other studies in the literature may have been underpowered. They tested 54 participants, but, to find a medium‐sized effect ( d = 0.50) in a between‐subjects design with standard levels for alpha and beta, one would need to test at least 128 participants.…”

“…Alcohol intoxication may not only affect the accuracy of the memory or the interpretation of the situation but it may also affect how well the witness thinks they remember the crime. Whereas such confidence tends to be measured at the time of memory retrieval (e.g., Flowe et al, ), Monds et al () examined how accurately witnesses can make judgments of learning at the time of encoding. Participants, who had either consumed alcohol (BrAC 0.06%) or a placebo, studied unfamiliar faces and indicated for each face the likelihood that they would recognize the face on a future memory test.…”

“…Although such dichotomous outcomes are relevant to the Criminal Justice System, they are less sensitive than the outcomes of studies in which the dependent variable has many more levels. Monds et al () addressed this issue by asking intoxicated and sober participants to remember 96 unfamiliar faces. Although the goal of their study was to examine the influence of alcohol intoxication on judgments of learning, they could also investigate its effect on face recognition.…”

“…Furthermore, the studies had a wide range of dependent variables. Besides free‐recall,cued‐recall, and recognition tasks about staged events, studies measured recall and recognition of words and word pairs (Maylor, Long, & Newstead, ), recognition of unfamiliar faces (Monds, Kloft, Sauer, Honan, & Palmer, ), disclosure of transgressions (Mindthoff et al, ), and interpretation of actions and reactions (Hildebrand Karlén, Lindqvist Bagge, Fahlke, & Armelius, ). Finally, not only does this Special Issue include experimental studies but it also includes a meta‐analysis (Jores, Colloff, Kloft, Smailes, & Flowe, ).…”