Dev complet (2e essai)

The transcription discusses how memory can be influenced by external factors, such as wording and suggestive questions, leading to inaccuracies in eyewitness testimonies. Studies by Lopez and Loptis demonstrate how subtle changes in wording can alter participants' memories, with time amplifying the misinformation effect. The impact of suggestive dialogue, exposure to media, and the weapon focus effect on memory accuracy in legal procedures is highlighted. Suggestions for improving lineup procedures, such as double-blind administration and utilizing show-ups, are also mentioned to prevent false identifications. The weapon focus effect, which draws attention away from crucial details during a crime, is explained through psychological arousal and attentional narrowing hypotheses. These findings emphasize the importance of considering memory distortions in legal investigations. Now, to illustrate these mistakes in memory, could you walk us through some key evidence? Of course. One pioneer in this area is Lopez. You might want to fasten your seatbelt, because we're talking about car crashes to explain our work on memory. Sounds promising already. In this experiment, all the participants watched a video of a car accident, and the task was to estimate the speed of the vehicle that caused the collision. But there is a twist. Some were asked how fast the car was going when they hit each other, and others heard the words smashed into each other. So they only changed one word? Exactly. And the results showed that the group in the hit condition reported lower speeds than the group in the smash condition. Yeah, it seems like the word smashed has a much stronger and more dramatic connotation than hit. And that would have influenced the participants' perception, making them see the crash as more violent and intense, right? And you know what? The most surprising part is that the participants came back a week later to answer some more questions about the video. The experimenters asked if they remembered seeing broken glass. I'm going to take a wild guess and assume there wasn't any? Exactly. There was no broken glass in that first video. But the people in the smash condition more often reported seeing glass compared to the people in the hit condition. I'm assuming this can be a big problem in legal situations, especially when dealing with witnesses. Absolutely. If I could give an example of what should be avoided, it's especially the use of suggestive questions. They can generally lead eyewitnesses to believe they remembered something that never actually happened. Imagine, a police officer might ask, do you remember seeing a white car? This question strongly suggests that there was a white car at the crime scene. That might unintentionally plant the idea in a witness's memory. Meaning they could really believe something that hasn't actually happened? That's what made this so much scarier. But we just have to remember that this is just one study in a lab setting. But these sort of findings led the National Institute of Justice, the NIJ, to create all sorts of guidelines for all the different members and parts of a case. Whether you're a dispatcher, an officer, or even a follow-up investigator, it is always important to use open-ended questions to avoid these sort of mistakes. Do you have more examples of studies though? Well, another study by Loptis showed that it's possible to experimentally modify participants' memories and that time can actually amplify this phenomenon. Like changing small details in someone's memory? Yep. In this experiment, participants were simply asked to watch a video of a car driving and striking a pedestrian near a street sign. The important part comes with the questionnaire that followed. In one specific question of the document, the sign was mentioned. There were three versions of this questionnaire. In one version, the mention of the traffic sign corresponded to what was shown in the video. What were the two other versions? One was a control version that didn't specify what kind of sign it was. The important one though is that last format, the misleading version. What Loptis did was ingenious. While subtly mentioning the sign, the misleading format referred to the wrong sign. So if in the video it was a stop sign, a participant who received the misleading version would read yield sign instead of stop sign. I'm confused. That seems rather insignificant. Just wait. Later, the participants had to choose between two pictures, one with the sign seen in the video and the other with a different sign. Those who received the misleading questionnaire were more likely to get it wrong. And what about time? You mentioned that it was a key part of the study. Yes, it's definitely important. When a longer delay was introduced between the video and the misleading information, people were more likely to be influenced by it. So did the memory get weaker just like the first scene from earlier? Absolutely. You're talking about transients. You're a good listener. Well, I do run a podcast. So just to be clear, time can make the misinformation effect even worse in real life. You know, police cases don't get resolved within a day. Who knows what misleading information can be introduced between a crime and an interrogation? This could derail what witnesses claim. Exactly. And not just because people are lying, but because their memories were unintentionally modified. Just think of all the news people are exposed to or even what they see on social media. Over time, that information can mix in with the original memory and even change how someone remembers it. The NIJ mentioned a few times in their guide that witnesses should even be instructed to avoid discussing cases with each other. They should also avoid contact with media and exposure to content concerning the incident. Unfortunately, though, you can't really completely protect the witnesses from being exposed. Imagine in a courtroom, lawyers can ask pretty specific questions. They could unintentionally plant some ideas using some suggestive dialogue that could lead to future further distortions. What is concerning is that this could, in a worst-case scenario, have impact on future trials, which could influence a jury, which could also influence a sentence. Just food for thought. Wow, that's something. So we've seen how outside information can influence memory over time. Could something coming from a person also edit or influence memory? Absolutely. Another study, Becoming Famous Overnight by Jacobi, illustrates this effect pretty well. Participants were given a list of names. Some people were famous and others were completely unknown. And then the next day, they had to come back and identify which names in a new list belonged to famous people. Seems simple enough. You'd think so. Surprisingly, some of the previously mentioned non-famous names were now labeled as famous. Why? Because the names felt familiar. Participants thought something like, I've definitely seen or heard this name before, but I don't remember where. So this person must be famous. So they basically remember the name itself, but not where it's from. Yep. And it's a classic memory error. Some people may remember information itself, but forget the context in which they encountered it. As a result, part of the memory becomes inaccurate. It's commonly called a source memory error. I can imagine that being problematic in legal procedures, especially since you're talking about here. Well, you guessed it. Imagine a witness trying to identify a face, but getting confused about where they've seen it. Maybe they saw that person or someone really similar, either earlier during the day, on TV, in a police lineup, at the store, or anywhere else. If they make a mistake because of this, it could be completely accidental? Exactly. It would just feel right to them, but that doesn't really make it true. There is some literature on how to avoid police lineup mistakes. Mainly, it is recommended to lead a double-blind procedure. This means that neither the administrator or the witness knows who the main suspect is because this helps reduce unintentional cueing. It is also recommended to mention that the perpetrator may not even be present in the lineup. The lineup should also consist of people matching the descriptions mentioned before by that same witness. All these things help avoid a situation where someone picks a suspect based on a feeling of familiarity instead of an accurate memory. So I'm assuming this could cost someone's freedom if there were a misidentification in a lineup. Is there another alternative to this method? Oh, they exist for sure. In their meta-analysis, Stieble claims that show-ups could also work as a decent alternative to a classic lineup. Show-ups consist of a one-man lineup generally not too long after the crime is committed. It's fairly common practice. They say that they generate similar amounts of correct guesses when the perpetrator is present in that so-called test, but show-ups are better than lineups when the perpetrator is absent. That's because the levels of correct rejections are superior in show-ups, which helps prevent more cases of false accusations. Are there other aspects that could make a police lineup or show-up less accurate? Are there other effects apart from suggestibility like we mostly talked about so far? Oh, absolutely. Another well-known phenomenon is called the weapon focus effect, and it can really interfere on how accurately people remember what they saw. What does this weapon effect imply? Several studies, including those by Lopez and 87, explain how the presence of a weapon affects memory. In real-life situations, a weapon tends to capture a person's attention pretty strongly. How do they know that a person is actually looking at the weapon? Why does this happen exactly? Research using simulated crime scenarios often uses eye tracking to confirm the presence of this effect. However, the reason behind this is still up for debate in the community. Fawcett and his colleagues present in their meta-analysis two hypotheses that could explain this effect. One suggests that the presence of a weapon increases psychological arousal that creates a certain attentional narrowing. The other hypothesis, called the unusual object hypothesis, claims that attention is focused on the weapon regardless of psychological arousal levels because it's unfamiliar. In other words, the witness pays less attention to other important details like the suspect's face or the victim or elements of the environment. We have to be careful, though, because these results are pulled from experiments done in labs. Does it have important consequences? Yes. It becomes problematic in legal contexts where a witness's memory will depend on that initial coding. Considering that the attention was drawn away from the face, it may be rather incomplete in witness testimony, which can lead to mistakes in trial, obviously. In history, many cases where DNA evidence overturned old verdicts of crimes that people had to go to jail for without even being guilty. Innocence Project is an organization that tells the stories of wrongly convicted people such as Cornelius Dupre. Though it is difficult to establish how strong the weapon effects were in such cases, we can understand its potential impacts. Dupre spent 30 years in prison for a crime he didn't even commit. According to that organization, eyewitnesses are by a long shot the leading cause of wrongful conviction. They claim that 75% of wrongful convictions had some sort of erroneous identification within the trial. That's awful. Since we've talked about how memories can have detailed changes, I'm wondering, is it possible to remember something that never actually happened? But first, can I ask you a question? Of course. Do you remember any memories from your childhood? Well, you know, I'm getting older now, so I probably have fewer memories than before. It feels like they faded over time, just like you mentioned earlier. But I can still recall some events very vividly, almost like I'm reliving them. Like that one time I got lost in a huge mall. It was traumatizing. I had lost my parents and there were so many strangers. That brings me exactly to my point. People often remember events and feel like those memories are accurate or very vivid. Here's the problem. When you rethink of a previous memory, it can actually get modified without you even realizing it. Almost as if you're opening a file on your computer, editing by accident that same file while rereading it, and pressing save for later. They call this the reconciliation effect. To go a bit further, what we remember now is influenced by who we are today, our beliefs, our values, and our experiences. So the past isn't an exact reflection of what really happened. It's more like the past seen through a lens of the present. Do you have any research for our listeners about this? Well, in an experiment conducted by LOCTSIS, participants' family members were asked to provide photos along with short descriptions of events from the participants' childhood. These photos were shown to the participants afterwards. They were then asked to describe what was happening in each one. Where is the twist in all of this? One of the photos depicted an event that never actually happened. It was completely fabricated, which was then confirmed by the family. When the participants first saw this false event, well, most of them obviously said they didn't remember it. So the experimenters provided additional details, presenting them as if they came from a family member. So it didn't have an effect? Not exactly, because a few days later, when the participants returned to the lab, something happened. They were asked to do the same thing again. When they encountered the false photo a second time, some began to remember the event. Some even added their own details, blending in the experimenter's description with personal details. This shows once again how suggestion can really modify your memory through your imagination. This can create very detailed but inaccurate memories over time. This ties back to the concept I mentioned earlier, source monitoring errors. It also describes another phenomenon that I didn't mention yet, semanticalization of memory. As memories consolidate, they gradually lose the context in which they were formed. And yes, this can definitely impact police investigations. Imagine trying to actually recall what you're doing seven Tuesdays ago. It would be difficult, right? Right. For our listeners, are there other ways we could tie this to forensic psychology? Well, when false evidence is presented to suspects, they can sometimes come to believe they actually committed the crime. This is especially true when other manipulative or coercive techniques are used to create pressure and a panic confession. This phenomenon is even more effective when individuals are stressed or fatigued. These techniques are no longer considered appropriate today, since they often lead people to believe these false infos. This could create instances of false confessions, and even in some cases. Yeah. So these studies are meant to illustrate, in a laboratory setting, memory flaws. These can also occur in real-life situations, especially in high-stakes contexts like police interrogations or courtroom eyewitness testimony. Mistakes could cost innocent people's lives if they lead to false verdicts, as we discussed. Yeah. That kind of wraps it up, yeah. So far, we've talked about false memories of relatively harmless childhood events. But what about so-called memories of trauma, like childhood sexual abuse? I imagine the legal consequences could be quite serious. Yeah, absolutely. And this has happened before. In some cases that were pretty controversial, especially in the 80s or the 90s, some therapeutic techniques like hypnosis or guided imagery could have created certain issues. Research in cognitive psychology says that they could potentially be suggestible, especially when dealing with childhood traumatic experiences. But this topic is still to debate, though. It seems that imagining an event can be powerful enough that, later on, people may come to believe they actually lived it. However, I do want to point out three important nuances about repressed memories of adverse experiences, like, for example, childhood abuse. Firstly, most people who experience childhood abuse do remember it. Secondly, while it is possible for memories to be forgotten or repressed, the opposite can also happen. Traumatic memories can also resurface in their consciousness. And thirdly, it is also possible to create false memories. Because of that last point, legal cases involving alleged childhood abuse reported many years later are often approached with great caution, especially if suggestion techniques like hypnosis or guided imagery were involved. This is also because wrongful convictions occurred in the past. In some cases, therapists were even accused of malpractice. All right, that's a good point to keep in mind. All right, that's a good point to keep in mind. Now for our listeners, let's do a quick recap of all these studies we mentioned today and how these... All right, this is a good point to keep in mind. Now for our listeners, let's do a quick recap of all the studies we mentioned today and how their results describe phenomena that impact forensic psychology.