Eyewitness Identification and the Accuracy of the Criminal Justice System

Clark, Steven E.; Benjamin, Aaron S.; Wixted, John T.; Mickes, Laura; Gronlund, Scott D.

doi:10.1177/2372732215602267

Cited by 23 publications

(25 citation statements)

References 61 publications

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“…In other words, the goal of our experiments is to utilize a theory of underlying psychological discriminability to make predictions about empirical discriminability. Other researchers have noted that it is critical to ground eyewitness ID research in theory (e.g., Clark, Benjamin, Wixted, Mickes, & Gronlund, 2015; Clark, Moreland, & Gronlund, 2014).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Lineup fairness: propitious heterogeneity and the diagnostic feature-detection hypothesis

et al. 2019

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Researchers have argued that simultaneous lineups should follow the principle of propitious heterogeneity, based on the idea that if the fillers are too similar to the perpetrator even an eyewitness with a good memory could fail to correctly identify him. A similar prediction can be derived from the diagnostic feature-detection (DFD) hypothesis, such that discriminability will decrease if too few features are present that can distinguish between innocent and guilty suspects. Our first experiment tested these predictions by controlling similarity with artificial faces, and our second experiment utilized a more ecologically valid eyewitness identification paradigm. Our results support propitious heterogeneity and the DFD hypothesis by showing that: 1) as the facial features in lineups become increasingly homogenous, empirical discriminability decreases; and 2) lineups with description-matched fillers generally yield higher empirical discriminability than those with suspect-matched fillers. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (10.1186/s41235-019-0172-5) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Lineup fairness: propitious heterogeneity and the diagnostic feature-detection hypothesis

et al. 2019

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“…One possible reason for this lack of clarity in the literature could be the absence of any theoretical guidance to help explain why varying lineup size should (or should not) matter. Our goal was to follow the recommendation that eyewitness ID research be more theory‐driven (e.g., Clark, Benjamin, Wixted, Mickes, & Gronlund, ).…”

Section: Diagnostic Feature‐detection Prediction Concerning Showups Amentioning

confidence: 99%

The number of fillers may not matter as long as they all match the description: The effect of simultaneous lineup size on eyewitness identification

Wooten

Carlson

Lockamyeir

et al. 2020

Applied Cognitive Psychology

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According to the Diagnostic Feature-Detection (DFD) hypothesis, the presence of fillers that match the eyewitness's description of the perpetrator will boost discriminability beyond a showup, and very few fillers may suffice to produce the advantage.We tested this hypothesis by comparing showups with simultaneous lineups of size 3, 6, 9, and 12. Participants (N = 10,433) were randomly assigned to one of these conditions, as well as target-present (TP) versus target-absent (TA) lineup. As predicted by the DFD hypothesis, lineups were superior to showups, and there was no advantage with increased lineup size beyond a 3-member lineup. The confidenceaccuracy (CA) relationship held a similar pattern. The only effect of increased lineup size was a lower likelihood of choosing a suspect (guilty or innocent). We conclude that police should focus more on the quality rather than quantity of fillers. K E Y W O R D S diagnostic feature-detection hypothesis, eyewitness identification, lineup size, showups, simultaneous lineup

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“…Previous research indicates that there is an association between high confidence and identification accuracy (for an overview see, Wixted & Wells, 2017), and although some results suggest that the relationship will be negatively impacted by sub-optimal conditions (Deffenbacher, 2008), other suggest this not to be the case (Clark et al, 2015;Palmer, Brewer, Weber, & Nagesh, 2013;Semmler et al, 2018;Sporer et al, 1995;Wixted & Wells, 2017). The latter viewpoint is based on the notion that the relationship between confidence and accuracy will not deteriorate depending on external factors, assuming that the investigation is conducted under pristine conditions, but that sub-optimal conditions will naturally entail a lower average of confidence.…”

Section: Confidence and Response Timesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The identification task (or multiple-choice task) that we employed differs from a response task where there are both target present and absent line-ups (regarding the identification task see e.g., Duncan, 2006). In eyewitness research it is common practice to use a decision task, where both target present and target absent line-ups are used in order to assess diagnostic accuracy or diagnosticity based on signal detection theory (e.g., Clark, Benjamin, Wixted, Mickes, & Gronlund, 2015;Clark & Godfrey, 2009). Diagnosticity denotes the likelihood that an identified person (from a line-up) is the actual person that was observed (Wells & Lindsay, 1980).…”

Section: The Present Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

A stab in the Dark - PRE-PRINT

Nyman¹,

Antfolk²,

Lampinen³

et al. 2018

Preprint

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Prior research shows that increased distance and decreased light result in less correct eyewitness identifications, yet their combined effect is unknown. The aim of the present study was to establish the maximum distance in low lux (lx) where an eyewitness’s later identification in target present (TP) line-ups is no longer reliable. We randomized participants (N = 178) into one of three lx conditions (high:300lx, medium:10lx, low:0.7lx) and presented them with eight targets (one at a time) at eight separate distances (6-20 meters). Each target-presentation was followed by an 8-person simultaneous TP line-up (i.e., there was a .125 probability of choosing the target correctly by chance). We found that the rate of correct TP identifications decreased with increased distance in all lx conditions. At 20 meters the rate of correct TP identifications was .53 in the high lx condition, .41 in the medium lx condition and .11 in the low lx condition. The generalizability of our findings to overall eyewitness accuracy is limited by the exclusion of target absent line-ups, yet our findings show that reliable and correct target present identifications are very unlikely following observations made in low lighting (0.7 lx) at 20 meters.

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Eyewitness Identification and the Accuracy of the Criminal Justice System

Cited by 23 publications

References 61 publications

Lineup fairness: propitious heterogeneity and the diagnostic feature-detection hypothesis

Lineup fairness: propitious heterogeneity and the diagnostic feature-detection hypothesis

The number of fillers may not matter as long as they all match the description: The effect of simultaneous lineup size on eyewitness identification

A stab in the Dark - PRE-PRINT

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