The effectiveness of eye‐closure in repeated interviews

Abstract

Purpose Closing the eyes during recall can help witnesses remember more about a witnessed event. This study examined the effectiveness of eye‐closure in a repeated recall paradigm with immediate free recall followed 1 week later by both free and cued recall. We examined whether eye‐closure was more or less effective during the second free‐recall attempt compared with the first, whether eye‐closure during the first recall attempt had an impact on subsequent free‐ and cued‐recall performance, and whether eye‐closure during the second free recall could facilitate the recall of new, previously unreported, information (reminiscence). Method Participants witnessed a videotaped event and participated in a first free‐recall attempt (with eyes open or closed) a few minutes later. After a week, they provided another free recall, followed by a cued‐recall interview (with eyes open or closed). Results Eye‐closure during the first free‐recall attempt had no significant effect on performance during any of the recall attempts. However, eye‐closure during the second session increased the amount of correct visual information reported in that session by 36.7% in free recall and by 35.3% in cued recall, without harming testimonial accuracy. Crucially, eye‐closure also facilitated the recall of new, previously unreported visual information. Conclusions The findings extend previous research in showing that the eye‐closure instruction can still be effective when witnesses are interviewed repeatedly, and that it can facilitate the elicitation of new information. Thus, the eye‐closure instruction constitutes a simple and time‐efficient interview tool for police interviewers.

Does rapport‐building boost the eyewitness eyeclosure effect in closed questioning?

“…In contrast, Vredeveldt and colleagues have gathered evidence in favour of modality‐specific processes. In particular, when focusing solely on witnesses' reporting of highly specific, fine‐grained details, they found that eyeclosure selectively enhances visual recall (e.g., Vredeveldt & Penrod, ; Vredeveldt et al ., ). Together these findings point to both modality‐specific and generalized cognitive processes underpinning eyeclosure effects.…”

“…For instance, Perfect et al (2008) found that people who closed their eyes whilst remembering events were better able to correctly answerand less likely to incorrectly answerquestions about those events, compared to people who kept their eyes open. Other studies show that the benefits of eyeclosure uphold when people recall events that occurred 1 week or even several years beforehand (Vredeveldt, Baddeley, & Hitch, 2014;Wagstaff et al, 2004), as well as in non-laboratory settings (Vredeveldt & Penrod, 2013). There is therefore much to gain from understanding the boundaries of this technique's potential.…”

Detection of Concealment in an Information‐Gathering Interview

“…One aim of an investigative interview is to encourage interviewees to recall and report all relevant information they can remember (Bull, ; Fisher, ). There are several ways to help people to remember and report more information in the course of an interview, one of which is by asking people to close their eyes while discussing their activities (Perfect et al, ; Vredeveldt, Baddeley, & Hitch, ; Vredeveldt, Baddeley, & Hitch, ; Vredeveldt, Hitch, & Baddeley, ; Vredeveldt & Penrod, ). Fisher and Geiselman () argued that closing the eyes facilitates recall because it leads to more focussed concentration and blocks out visual (and perhaps other) sources of interference (see also Glenberg, Schroeder, & Robertson, ; Wagstaff et al, ).…”

Inconsistent findings for the eyes closed effect in children: the implications for interviewing child witnesses

“…Following previous findings for both adults and children that eyes closed interviews are still beneficial after a delay (Natali et al, 2012; Vredeveldt et al, 2013) we expected children to recall more when interviewed with eyes closed than with eyes open a week after the event.…”