Factors affecting EWT: misleading information

Leading questions:

Loftus and Palmer (1974) found the harsher the verb the more likely the pps were to say that the car was going fast. The mean speed for the verb smashed was 40.5mph compared to contacted which was 31.8mph

Response bias:

Wording of the question has no effect on their memories but just influences how they will answer the question

Substitution explanation:

The wording of a question actually changes the pps memory, for example pps who heard the word smashed said that they saw broken glass

Post-event discussion:

Gabbert (2003) pps watched a film in pairs but from different view points. The pps discussed with each other what they saw before recall

He found 71% of those that discussed their events mistakenly recalled events but with the control group 0% made a mistake

Memory conformity:

Discussion has no effect on their memories but they change what they say to win social approval

Memory contamination:

Discussion changes their memories due to misinformation or mixing up memories

Real-world application

Shows how leading questions can have a real affect on police interviewing and that we need to stop leading questions. Making police questions more accurate helping crimes, increase usefulness

Not generalisable

Older people are worse at recalling events than younger people. Anastasi and Rhodes (2006) found that people in 18-25 age groups were more accurate than people in 50-78 years. This could make research inaccurate as they normally use young pps

Artificial tasks

In Loftus and Palmers research they watched a car crash. This would be very different to actually witnessing a real life car crash, (more fear/distraction). This has low ecological validity