A Lie and a Mistress: On Increasing the Believability of Your Alibi

Nieuwkamp, Ricardo; Horselenberg, Robert; Koppen, P.J. van

doi:10.1080/13218719.2016.1142934

Cited by 17 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 23 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…A selection bias could be a second limitation of the present study because at first, the friends and family of the first author were asked to fill out and forward the questionnaire. Nieuwkamp et al () used a similar methodology where a second group of participants (i.e., a sample of community members who were recruited in a dance school) was added to control for a possible selection bias. No difference was observed between both groups of participants for their demographics and their answers on the dependent variables.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…At first, friends, colleagues, and family from the first author were sent an e‐mail with the link. They were in turn asked to send their colleagues and friends the link to the questionnaire because we aimed at a large sample of participants, a similar method as used by Nieuwkamp et al (). In that study, the authors selected two groups of community members.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Although recent research also shows that evidence is an influential factor determining alibi believability (e.g., Jung et al, ; Pozzulo, Pettalia, Dempsey, & Gooden, ), it is also known that, contrary to what Olson and Wells () argued, other factors affect the alibi believability too. For instance, the consistency of the alibi (Culhane & Hosch, ; Nieuwkamp, Horselenberg, & Van Koppen, ), the context in which the alibi is first presented (Sommers & Douglass, ), and the salaciousness of the alibi (Allison, Jung, Sweeney, & Culhane, ; Allison, Mathews, & Michael, ; Jung et al, ; Nieuwkamp et al, ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

The illusion of the perfect alibi: Establishing the base rate of non‐offenders' alibis

Nieuwkamp

Horselenberg

Koppen

2016

Journal Invest Psychology

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The present study was designed to establish the base rate of alibis and supportive evidence for alibis of non-offenders. That is important because the presence and lack of an alibi are often seen as a clear indicator of innocence and guilt, respectively, of a suspect. A large sample of laypersons (N = 841) was randomly assigned to one of 32 conditions in which they were asked to generate a true alibi after they were falsely accused of being the perpetrator of a mock robbery. Each condition consisted of either a Tuesday or a Saturday and one of 16 timeframes. In general, the majority of the participants had an alibi (99.5%) and supportive evidence for their alibis (92.4%). The supportive evidence often consisted of a combination of supportive evidence rather than one distinct form of supportive evidence (33.3%). Although it is widely assumed that the alibi believability is determined based on the strength of the supportive evidence, our results show that the type of evidence that can be presented by laypeople depends upon the day and the timeframe wherein the crime has been committed. The results of the study therefore imply that determining alibi believability solely on the strength of the supportive evidence is not a fair measure.We suggest that the believability should also be based on the base rate of alibis and its supportive evidence. KEYWORDS alibi, base rate, supportive evidence, taxonomy

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

The illusion of the perfect alibi: Establishing the base rate of non‐offenders' alibis

Nieuwkamp

Horselenberg

Koppen

2016

Journal Invest Psychology

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Indeed, further demonstrating people's intolerance for memory errors, Nieuwkamp, Horselenberg and Van Koppen () found that people were more tolerant of a person changing their alibi because they lied the first time – to cover up the fact they were doing something salacious – than merely because they made a mistake.…”

Section: Alibi Evaluation Phasementioning

confidence: 99%

Memory Errors in Alibi Generation: How an Alibi Can Turn Against Us

Crozier

Strange

Loftus

2017

Behavioral Sci & The Law

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Alibis play a critical role in the criminal justice system. Yet research on the process of alibi generation and evaluation is still nascent. Indeed, similar to other widely investigated psychological phenomena in the legal system - such as false confessions, historical claims of abuse, and eyewitness memory - the basic assumptions underlying alibi generation and evaluation require closer empirical scrutiny. To date, the majority of alibi research investigates the social psychological aspects of the process. We argue that applying our understanding of basic human memory is critical to a complete understanding of the alibi process. Specifically, we challenge the use of alibi inconsistency as an indication of guilt by outlining the "cascading effects" that can put innocents at risk for conviction. We discuss how normal encoding and storage processes can pose problems at retrieval, particularly for innocent suspects that can result in alibi inconsistencies over time. Those inconsistencies are typically misunderstood as intentional deception, first by law enforcement, affecting the investigation, then by prosecutors affecting prosecution decisions, and finally by juries, ultimately affecting guilt judgments. Put differently, despite the universal nature of memory inconsistencies, a single error can produce a cascading effect, rendering an innocent individual's alibi, ironically, proof of guilt. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

show abstract

“…Strange, Dysart, & Loftus, 2014). Lastly, a suspect may also lie about an alibi to conceal his or her involvement in another, but shameful situation (Nieuwkamp, Horselenberg, & Van Koppen, 2016). The assumption that non-offenders are able to present strong supportive evidence for their alibis has proven to be incorrect (Culhane, Hosch, & Kehn, 2008;Culhane et al, 2013;Olson & Charman, 2012).…”

Section: Alibi Researchmentioning

confidence: 99%

True and false alibis among prisoners and their detection by police detectives

Nieuwkamp

Horselenberg

Koppen

2018

Psychiatry, Psychology and Law

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The present study was designed to determine whether differences exist between true and false alibis and how accurate police detectives and lay people are in determining the veracity of alibis. This article provides a replication of the research by Culhane et al. (2013) with more representative participants. In the first experiment, real suspects in a remand prison generated true or false alibis. In the second experiment, a subset of those alibis were written out and were provided to experienced police officers and students for alibi evaluation and discrimination. Our results show that differentiating between true and false alibis is difficult, and even when more representative materials and participants are included, the accuracy did not exceed 60%. Interestingly we found that students and police officers focus on other aspects during the alibi discrimination. Thus, research using student participant cannot be, directly, used in alibi discrimination studies.

show abstract

A Lie and a Mistress: On Increasing the Believability of Your Alibi

Cited by 17 publications

References 23 publications

The illusion of the perfect alibi: Establishing the base rate of non‐offenders' alibis

The illusion of the perfect alibi: Establishing the base rate of non‐offenders' alibis

Memory Errors in Alibi Generation: How an Alibi Can Turn Against Us

True and false alibis among prisoners and their detection by police detectives

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About