Eyewitness Testimony

By shedding light on the many factors that can intervene and create inaccurate testimony, Elizabeth Loftus illustrates how memory can be radically altered by the way an eyewitness is questioned, and how new memories can be implanted and old ones changed in subtle ways.

This volume provides a tutorial review and evaluation of scientific research on the accuracy and reliability of eyewitness identification. The book starts with the perspective that there are a variety of conceptual and empirical problems with eyewitness identification as a form of forensic evidence, just as there are a variety of problems with other forms of forensic evidence. There is then an examination of the important results in the study of eyewitness memory and the implications of this research for psychological theory and for social and legal policy. The volume takes the perspective that research on eyewitness identification can be seen as the paradigmatic example of how psychological science can be successfully applied to real-world problems.

Noted New Testament scholar Bauckham challenges the prevailing assumption the accounts of Jesus circulated as "anonymous community traditions," instead asserting that they were transmitted in the name of the original eyewitness.

Eyewitnesses play an important role in criminal cases when they can identify culprits. Estimates suggest that tens of thousands of eyewitnesses make identifications in criminal investigations each year. Research on factors that affect the accuracy of eyewitness identification procedures has given us an increasingly clear picture of how identifications are made, and more importantly, an improved understanding of the principled limits on vision and memory that can lead to failure of identification. Factors such as viewing conditions, duress, elevated emotions, and biases influence the visual perception experience. Perceptual experiences are stored by a system of memory that is highly malleable and continuously evolving, neither retaining nor divulging content in an informational vacuum. As such, the fidelity of our memories to actual events may be compromised by many factors at all stages of processing, from encoding to storage and retrieval. Unknown to the individual, memories are forgotten, reconstructed, updated, and distorted. Complicating the process further, policies governing law enforcement procedures for conducting and recording identifications are not standard, and policies and practices to address the issue of misidentification vary widely. These limitations can produce mistaken identifications with significant consequences. What can we do to make certain that eyewitness identification convicts the guilty and exonerates the innocent? Identifying the Culprit makes the case that better data collection and research on eyewitness identification, new law enforcement training protocols, standardized procedures for administering line-ups, and improvements in the handling of eyewitness identification in court can increase the chances that accurate identifications are made. This report explains the science that has emerged during the past 30 years on eyewitness identifications and identifies best practices in eyewitness procedures for the law enforcement community and in the presentation of eyewitness evidence in the courtroom. In order to continue the advancement of eyewitness identification research, the report recommends a focused research agenda. Identifying the Culprit will be an essential resource to assist the law enforcement and legal communities as they seek to understand the value and the limitations of eyewitness identification and make improvements to procedures.

Now in full colour, this thoroughly revised and updated 3rd edition of Psychology for AS Level takes into account all the latest changes to the AQA-A syllabus since the last edition was published. It remains closely mapped to the specification making it ideal for students taking the AS Level Psychology exam. New to this edition is a strong emphasis on exam technique, giving students the best chance possible of the highest grades. A whole chapter is devoted to how to study and how to pass, with an 'Examiner's Viewpoint' written by the Chief Examiner at AQA-A. Throughout the book are hints and tips on picking up marks, and there are constant page references to the summarised content in our companion AS revision guide. Further examination support is provided by our accompanying student website, AS Online, available on a subscription basis to all schools and sixth form colleges that adopt the text. This includes a Student Workbook, interactive exercises, sample essays, interactive multiple-choice questions, a complete Exam Companion and much more. We also provide teacher resources free of charge to qualifying adopters which include a week-by-week teaching plan, sample essays, chapter-by-chapter lecture presentations, and classroom exercises and activities. Please see http://www.a-levelpsychology.co.uk/online for further details of these resources and a demo chapter of AS Online. The book includes coverage of six key areas in psychology: human memory, attachments in development, stress, abnormality, social influence and research methods. It retains the thorough content, volume of features and excellent writing style of previous editions but the layout is now fully structured to improve accessibility. Unlike other A-Level textbooks which focus solely on passing the exam, ‘Psychology for AS Level’ is also designed to foster an interest in the study of psychology as a subject. To this end, the book includes an additional general chapter to introduce the theories and explanations that make psychology a fascinating discipline.