The application of multiple lineups in a field study

Abstract

The usefulness of multiple lineups was tested in a field experiment with nine different targets. Six hundred and forty-eight passers-by were asked for directions in the pedestrian zone of a university town. Subsequently, they were approached by a different person and asked to identify the target from portrait, body, and profile lineups. Additionally, participants were asked to identify a shopping bag that the target had carried. Two of the lineups were target-present, and two target-absent. Diagnosticity ratios (DRs) were computed for target/suspect choices, lineup rejections and foil choices. Compared to foil choices and rejections, target/suspect choices were most diagnostic of guilt. Here, the combination of lineups was superior over individual lineups. Lineup rejections showed some capability of establishing innocence, but with lower DRs than target/suspect choices. Here, combinations did not increase diagnosticity. The diagnosticity of multiple foil choices was acceptable for portrait face lineups but limited for all other lineups or combinations.

Advances in Psychology and Law

“…Watching a (violent) video may not induce the type of stress one would expect to be present in crime situations when one's life may be threatened by a weapon. An interesting study combining the video paradigm with a modern stress-inducing procedure has recently been published by Sauerland et al ( 2014 ). To simulate real crime situations, fi lms should be produced from a victim's perspective or systematically vary victim and bystander perspective.…”

“…As in real crime situations descriptions and/or identifi cations are likely to be after some substantial delay of days, weeks, or even months, simulation studies should also involve longer retention intervals (cf. Sauerland et al, 2014 ).…”

“…Effects appear to be stronger with emotional than neutral material (usually words) but important moderator variables like time of day (see the meta-analysis by as well as individual, developmental, and gender differences in hormonal responding (Buchanan, Tranel, & Adolphs, 2006 ;Quas, 2011 ) may moderate some of the effects obtained. First applications of these newer stress-inducing techniques and measurements of hormonal levels in eyewitness studies are underway but results are still too inconclusive to draw fi rm conclusions (Rush, Quas, Nikolayev, Yim, Clark, & Larson, 2014 ;Sauerland et al 2014 ). 1 In summary, the traditional arousal approach predicts that higher levels of arousal will produce poorer eyewitness memories compared to lower levels of arousal (Deffenbacher et al, 2004 ).…”

“…Apparently, participants are not placing themselves in the role of the threatened victim in the fi lm. Rather than using self-report, future studies should attempt to measure arousal levels more directly with physiological measures like heart rates, Galvanic skin responses, or, perhaps more informative, salivary cortisol levels (see Schwabe et al, 2012 ;Smeets et al 2008 ;Sauerland et al 2014 ).…”

Individual differences in eyewitness accuracy across multiple lineups of faces

“…One approach under investigation in psychology to address this problem is a multiple-lineup method. In this method, eyewitnesses are required to identify a perpetrator repeatedly, but from different person aspects that might have been observed at a crime scene, such as the face, body, voice, clothing, or accessories (Lindsay, Wallbridge, & Drennan, 1987 ; Pryke, Lindsay, Dysart, & Dupuis, 2004 ; Sauerland & Sporer, 2008 ; Sauerland, Stockmar, Sporer, & Broers, 2013 ). These studies show that the selection of the same identity from different lineup combinations can be used to assess the likelihood that a correct target selection has been made.…”