Introduction
Eye witness testimony plays a crucial role within the legal system and has emerged as an important area for researchers. It refers to witness and victim memories of what happened, the situations and explanation of the people caught up in the incident and the recognition of the people responsible for the incident. Information got from an eyewitness plays a crucial role in answering many questions of the legal system, because it can provide key progress in an investigation (Fulero et al 2009). Eye witness testimony is also influential in the courtroom where little evidence is as convincing as eyewitness testimony.
Given the most victims or onlooker observers are honest, questions come up concerning the accuracy and comprehensiveness of eyewitness testimony, and what factors cause the likelihood of fault or prejudice. Even though the criminal justice systems keenly search for eyewitness descriptions and recognition evidence for their research and hearing of crimes, such evidence is acknowledged as the main basis of bogus convictions. Advice by psychologists of the potential limitations of eye witness testimony based on experimental laboratory study, dramatic illegal events, field test, case studies, survey, and archival examination of police records and court documents (Russell & Jarvis 2003).
Factors affecting Eye witness Testimony
Several factors may influence the exactness of eyewitness testimony because they can be controlled in research, therefore the force of such factors on witness accuracy has to be anticipated or taken into consideration. Study investigative factors such as gender, race, or intelligence have not exposed any principally strong effects of indicating that members of some groups are better witnesses than others. Nor has research acknowledged any strong associations between eye witness accuracy and individuality factors. No convincing theory connecting character traits to eyewitness recognition has surfaced (Towl & David 2010).
However, the age of the witness has been over and over again associated with identification accuracy. When the first determined person responsible for the crime is present in the lineup, both children and elderly adults do not defer considerably from young adults in their capacity to properly identify the perpetrator (Eysenck 1996). Conversely, when the perpetrator is absent both young children and elderly witnesses are more likely than young adults to make wrong identification of a guiltless person. This is so because children’s identification performance is hindered by a deciding problem because they are not strong at examining their own memory.
Additionally, aging is normally linked to reduced cognitive capacity, thus it seems doubtful that the explanations for complexity experienced by younger witnesses will also be valid to older witnesses (Towl & David 2010).
The nature of exposure duration or the length of time the witness had to see the perpetrator is also another factor that influences the accuracy of eyewitness testimony. The duration of time used up in viewing a perpetrator increases the probability of an accurate recognition decision. The longer the exposure duration of an event, the greater the chances to recall more features and greater the accuracy in memory and identification. But, estimations of the duration of the event are normally overestimated for relatively short-duration events; a few seconds up to two or three minutes, and underestimated for long durations; twenty minutes or more (Fulero et al 2009).
Another conflicting feature of a criminal incident is the amount of tension or fear a witness may experience. Witnesses who have gone through a high-stress questioning were considerably less likely to properly identify the person in question. The connection between fear and enhanced memory for intimidating motivation has been noted by investigators accessing the accuracy and completeness of eye witness testimony. Nervous people also show concentration and memory biases portrayed by a reaction to intimidation. This prejudice is found most reliably when investigators access threat-related information rather than retrieval (Eysenck 2005).
Eye witness testimony is often unclear because memories of the event are made inaccurate by the information presented later than in the leading questions. Hypnosis can increase what eyewitnesses can remember; though, it makes them less careful and more likely to produce incorrect memories. The memory of eyewitnesses is diminished if they observe a violent crime, and their memory can be distorted by remembering what was expected rather than what actually happened (Russell & Jarvis 2003).
Important differences in the exactness of reports happen as a function of differences in viewing conditions. Accuracy of recalling and recognition are subjected to the amount of light accessible during the scene of a crime. The amount of light available is certainly a suitable factor. A witness could remember less about an event that took place at dusk rather than during the day or at night and, similarly found that accuracy of incident details and identification of the people involved was better during day time than at the end of dusk or during the hours of darkness (Towl & David 2010)
Memory does diminish over time, with the most decrement in recognition accuracy happening after a delay of approximately one week. The pace of not recalling depends upon such factors as the kind and importance of the information to be recalled; the level of new learning; hint decay; the power and likeness of formerly acquired information; and the nature of invents which occur during the maintenance interval.
Between the time that a crime was experienced and the recognition test memory demonstration can be distorted, changed, or replaced by post-event misinformation. Ross et al (1994) said “witnesses may get new ideas about the event and the suspect through talking with other witnesses, hearing the reports of other witnesses, getting information from the media, and through leading or suggestive questions by police”.
The recovery of eyewitness recollections relies greatly upon the sufficiency of the interview procedures exploited. Forensic hypnosis methods have been used; hypnosis may taint memory and result in false recall and pointing out the wrong suspect with high assurance for events and people that were never experienced. A better method over hypnosis is the cognitive interview method (Brown & Campbell, 2010).
Through situation restoration the cognitive interview is about asking victims and witnesses to restructure the crime sight and to re-experience their feelings psychologically; to remember everything that may be connected to the event as well as fractional or incomplete details that may not seem to be applicable; to recollect the events in varying sequential orders; and to remember the events from a range of views and settings (Towl & David 2010). Consideration is also given to the mechanism of communication such as bond building and interviewer public skills.
Another obvious reason why eyewitness testimony is so undependable is because the events they witness are usually unpredicted, and also eyewitness may not be concentrating to what is going on. A less clear explanation is that the memories eyewitness have of an event are delicate, and can be easily tampered with and made inaccurate by the leading questions asked of an eye witness. Leading questions change the participant’s memory of events; this may result to mistaken accounts of the witnessed event. It is likely that the initial memory may have been substituted or subjected to interference thus may not be accurate as a source of evidence (Brown & Campbell, 2010).
The existence of weapons prejudices an eyewitness’ capacity to perfectly recognize the perpetrators face. Many experimental and field studies indicate that if a witness to a crime sees the perpetrator having a weapon, such as a gun or a knife, they will tend to remember details of the weapon but be less precise on other parts of the scene, including his face. The weapons focus effect occurs because the existence of a weapon focuses concentration away from less vivid images, such as the face of the suspect. The existence of a weapon in the situation of a criminal offence is without uncertainty, worrying for both victims and witnesses. Towl & David (2010) argues ‘that it can be seen as a main object that stress a certain amount of attention from a witness, and would consequently reduce the witness’ memory of the features of the person carrying the weapon’.
Conclusion
When someone who has witnessed a crime recounts what he/she has seen with their own eyes he/she is believed. However, there is a substantial body of proof which indicates that eye witness is undependable, and it is likely that there are many unfair convictions as a result of flawed eye witness testimony explanation and lineup identification. The legal system and the police officers must be conscious of the psychological process that lie beneath this evidence, and the factors that lead to greater witness reliability.
Reference
Brown, Jennifer, M. & Campbell, Elizabeth, A. 2010, The Cambridge Handbook of Forensic psychology’, Cambridge University Press, pp. 177-189.
Eysenck, Michael, W., 1996, ‘Simply psychology’, Psychology Press Ltd, pp. 389-400.
Eysenck, Michael, W., 2005, ‘Psychology for AS level,’ Psychology Press Ltd, 3rd Edn, pp 79-81.
Fulero, Solomon M. & Wrightsman Lawrence S., 2009, ‘Forensic Psychology’Wardsworth Cengage Learning, 3rd Edn, pp. 240-256.
Julia, R., & Javis, M., 2003, ‘Angles on Applied Psychology’, Nelson Thornes Ltd, pp. 103-115.
Ross, David F., John, Don R., Toglia, Michael P., 1994, ‘Adult eyewitness testimony: current trends and developments,’Press Syndicate, pp. 245-250.
Towl, Graham, J. & David, A, 2010, Forensic Psychology’, British Psychological Society, pp. 161- 170.