Synopses & Reviews
Investigates the factors that influence the accuracy of eyewitness testimony.
Review
"Overall, if one were looking for a comprehensive book on research in eyewitness identification, this would be it." Jill Rowan, Bulletin of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law
Synopsis
Adult Eyewitness Testimony provides an overview of empirical research on eyewitness testimony and identification accuracy, covering both theory and application. The volume is organized to address three important issues: which psychological factors influence the accuracy of eyewitness reports; how should police procedures be organized to improve the chance of obtaining accurate information and whose testimony should be believed; and can jurors make a distinction between accurate and inaccurate witnesses? The book is crucial reading for memory researchers, as well as police officers, judges, lawyers and other members of the judicial system.
Table of Contents
List of contributors; Preface; Part I. Cognitive, Physical and Social Processes and Factors Influencing Eyewitness Recall and Identification: 1. Reports of suggested memories: do people truly believe them? Kenneth R. Weingardt, H. Kelly Toland and Elizabeth F. Loftus; 2. Memory source monitoring and eyewitness testimony D. Stephen Lindsay; 3. Understanding bystander misidentifications: the role of familiarity and contextual knowledge J. Don Read; 4. Unconscious transference and lineup identification: toward a memory blending approach David F. Ross, Stephen J. Ceci, David Dunning and Michael P. Toglia; 5. Earwitness evidence: memory for a perpetratorâs voice A. Daniel Yarmey; 6. Whole body information: its relevance to eyewitnesses Malcolm D. MacLeod, Jason N. Frowley and John W. Shepherd; 7. Actual victims and witnesses to robbery and fraud: an archival analysis Patricia A. Tollestrup, John W. Turtle and John C. Yuille; Part II. Lineup Construction and Collection of Testimony: 8. Conceptual, practical and empirical issues associated with eyewitness identification test media Brian L. Cutler, Garrett L. Berman, Steven Penrod and Ronald P. Fisher; 9. Biased lineups: where do they come from? R. C. L. Lindsay; 10. Evaluating the fairness of lineups John C. Brigham and Jeffrey E. Pfeifer; 11. Recommendations for properly conducted lineup identification tasks Gary L. Wells, Eric P. Seelau, Sheila M. Rydell and C. A. Elizabeth Luus; 12. Improving eyewitness testimony with the Cognitive Interview Ronald P. Fisher, Michelle R. McCauley and R. Edward Geiselman; Part III. Whom to Believe? Distinguishing Accurate from Inaccurate Eyewitnesses: 13. Distinguishing accurate from inaccurate eyewitness identifications: a reality monitoring approach Lisa Beth Stern and David Dunning; 14. Decision times and eyewitness identification accuracy in simultaneous and sequential lineups Siegfried Ludwig Sporer; 15. Individual differences in personality and eyewitness identification Harmon Hosch; 16. Eyewitness identification confidence C. A. Elizabeth Luus and Gary L. Wells; 17. Expectations of eyewitness performance: jurorsâverdicts do not follow from their beliefs R. C. L. Lindsay; 18. The appraisal of eyewitness testimony Michael R. Leippe; Name index; Subject index.