Positive and negative effects of physical context reinstatement on eyewitness recall and identification

Abstract

The impact of context reinstatement (CR) on eyewitness recall and identification was explored in this study. Participants viewed a video of a staged theft and, following a 1-week interval, were asked to identify the culprit and recall the event in either the same or in a different physical environment. Results suggested that CR enhanced the perceived familiarity of the lineup members, which in turn increased participants' willingness to identify someone in the lineup. Although CR significantly improved facial discrimination and identification accuracy when the target was present, it also increased confidence ratings beyond that warranted by the increase in accuracy. In terms of recall, reinstating the study context improved participants' free recall of both central and peripheral details and cued recall of peripheral details. The results were consistent with a (mis)attribution of familiarity and the outshining hypothesis.

Eyewitness Identification Accuracy: The Influence of Olfactory Stimuli Used as a Form of Context Reinstatement

“…Further, context reinstatement has been found to enhance participants' judgments of familiarity about individuals shown in a lineup, regardless of their identification accuracy (Sanders, 1984). Various other studies have found similar results (Wong & Read, 2011;Hanczakowski et al, 2014). Given these results, it was predicted that in the current study, participants in the matched context conditions would make fewer correct rejections (i.e., lower accuracy) with a target-absent lineup than those in the mismatched context condition.…”

“…Finally, the retrieval phase is the process in which previously stored information is either recalled or recognized. A change in contextual information at encoding and retrieval is one factor that can influence memory accuracy (Wong & Read, 2011).…”

“…One phenomenon that has been said to influence how well information is retrieved (i.e., remembered) after it is encoded (i.e., stored) is known as context reinstatement (CR). CR is when features of one's environment are similar during encoding of information and then again at retrieval (Sanders, 1984;Wong & Read, 2011). CR will be discussed in terms of how it influences recall memory and facial identification accuracy.…”

“…Specifically, context reinstatement (CR) refers to the idea that there is improved efficiency of information retrieval when features of a person's environment are similar during both information encoding and then at retrieval (Sanders, 1984;Wong & Read, 2011). Models of episodic memory within the field of cognitive neuroscience can help to explain the processes involved in context reinstatement.…”

“…Despite various findings that have demonstrated the influence of context reinstatement on eyewitness identification, context reinstatement may sometimes have a negative effect on identification accuracy. Wong and Read (2011) studied both the positive and negative effects of context reinstatement on eyewitness identification. They asked 160 participants to watch a video showing a staged theft.…”