Purpose. Previous laoratory-based research suggests that facial composites, or pictures of suspected criminals, from UK computerized systems are named correctly about 20% of the time. The current work compares composites from several such systems following a more realistic interval between seeing an 'assailant' and constructing a composite. Included are those used by police in the UK (E-FIT, PROfit and sketch), and the USA (FACES), and a system in development (EvoFIT).\ud Method. Participant-witnesses inspected a photograph of a celebrity for 1 minute and then 2 days later constructed a composite from one of these systems using a procedure closely matching that found in police work; for example, the use of a Cognitive Interview and computer operators/artists who were appropriately trained and experienced. Evaluation was assessed mainly by asking independent observers to name the composites. Two common auxiliary measures were used, requiring composites to be matched to their targets (sorting), and photographs to be chosen from an array of alternatives (line-up).\ud Results. Composite naming was surprisingly low (3% overall), with sketches named best at 8%. Whereas composite sorting revealed a broadly similar pattern to naming, photo line-ups gave a poor match.\ud Conclusion. With a 2 days delay to construction, the results suggest that, while likenesses can be achieved, few composites would be named in police work. The composite sorting data provide further evidence that the computerized systems tested perform equivalently but are poorer than the manually-generated sketches. Lastly, the data suggest that line-ups may be a poor instrument for evaluating facial composites

An evaluation of E-FIT, PROfit, Sketch, Photofit and EvoFIT composite construction techniques was carried out in a ''forensically friendly format'': composites of unfamiliar targets were constructed from memory following a 3 Á/4-hour delay using a Cognitive Interview and experienced operators. The main dependent variable was spontaneous naming and overall performance was low (10% average naming rate). E-FITs were named better than all techniques except PROfit, though E-FIT was superior to PROfit when the target was more distinctive. E-FIT, PROfit and Sketch were similar overall in a composite sorting task, but Sketch emerged best for more average-looking targets. Photofit performed poorly, as did EvoFIT, an experimental system. Overall, facial distinctiveness was found to be an important factor for composite naming.

Abstract.Four different participants constructed face composites, using "PRO-Fit", of familiar and unfamiliar targets, with reference images present or from memory. The "mean" of all four composites, created by morphing (4-Morph) was rated as a better likeness than individual composites on average, and was as good as the best individual likeness. When participants attempted to identify targets from line-ups, 4-Morphs again performed as well as the best individual composite. In a second experiment participants familiar with target women attempted to identify composites, and the trend showed better recognition from multiple composites, whether combined or shown together. In a line-up task with unfamiliar participants, 4-Morphs produced most correct choices, and fewest false positives from target absent or target present arrays. These results have practical implications for the way evidence from different witnesses is used in police investigations. 2Four heads are better than one

This paper examines two facial composite systems that present multiple faces during construction to more closely resemble natural face processing. We evaluated a 'parallel' version of PRO-fit, which presents facial features in sets of six or twelve, and EvoFIT, a system in development, that contains a holistic face model and an evolutionary interface. The PRO-fit parallel interface turned out not to be quite as good as the 'serial' version as it appeared to interfere with holistic face processing. Composites from EvoFIT were named almost three times better than PRO-fit, but a benefit emerged under feature encoding, suggesting that recall has a greater role for EvoFIT than previously thought. In general, an advantage was found for feature encoding, replicating a previous finding in this area, and also for a novel 'holistic' interview. (131 words) Keywords: facial composite; parallel presentation; memory; holistic; witness 2 Witnesses and victims of serious crime may construct a visual likeness of a suspect's face. This is known as a facial composite and is typically obtained by describing the appearance of a suspect and selecting facial features: hair, face shape, eyes, nose, etc. Facial composites were originally the domain of artists, professionals who sketched with pencils or crayons, but other approaches were developed for those less artistic. Examples include Identikit and Photofit, available about 40 years ago. Research has identified problems with them, including both a limitation in the range of features (Davies 1983) and feature selection carried out in isolation from a whole face, a suboptimal procedure: features are normally seen in the context of a whole face (Davies and Christie 1982, Tanaka andSengco 1997). These issues appear resolved with the modern systems and very good likenesses are now possible (Cutler et al., 1988, Koehn and Fisher 1997, Davies et al., 2000.E-FIT and PRO-fit are computerised versions of Photofit used by police forces throughout the world. They have been found to produce composites that are named about 18% of the time from laboratory witnesses working from a recent memory of a target face (Brace et al., 2000, Bruce et al., 2002, Davies et al., 2000, Frowd et al., 2004, 2005a, a finding which suggests that most composites go unnamed. The situation is more worrying, however, when a more realistic delay to construction is used. Research by Frowd et al. (2005b) found that less than 1% of composites from E-FIT and PRO-fit were correctly named with a 2 day delay. We note a similar finding for the Mac-A-Mug Pro, a sketch-based computerised system (Koehn and Fisher 1997).Why might naming be so low for composites constructed after 2 days? Frowd et al. (2005b) proposed that this could be the result of a witness's memory becoming more of an impression after such a delay, with weakened access to facial features. Their work compared several systems including E-FIT, PRO-fit and a sketch artist. While performance was low after 2 days, composites from the sketch artist were better. T...

Research has undoubtedly led to a number of important changes to the way police obtain eyewitness identification evidence in a number of countries. However, despite these successes and the significant effort made by researchers to communicate key findings to public agencies, policy-makers and influential law enforcement personnel using a broad range of evidence, relevant policy and practice have either been very slow to respond or have not changed to incorporate the suggestions at all. In this article we employed an online survey to explore the knowledge and opinions of front-line policing practitioners in the UK regarding eyewitness research and practice. This was undertaken to determine how familiar less-senior, operational staff were with key research findings, what their opinions of current practice were and crucially, their views on how identification procedures should be improved compared with the recommendations made by researchers. The results revealed a fundamental mismatch between research and practice, with practitioners indicating a need to increase the rate of positive identifications and research tending to focus on methods of reducing false identifications. This result suggests that an approach driven by the need for the police to produce convictions may be an important factor that is blocking the translation of eyewitness identification research into practice.