A survey of what legal populations believe and know about inattentional blindness and visual detection.

Inattentional blindness refers to when people fail to notice obvious and unexpected events when their attention is elsewhere. Existing research suggests that inattentional blindness is a poorly understood concept that violates the beliefs that are commonly held by the public about vision and attention. Given that legal cases may involve individuals who may have experienced inattentional blindness, it is important to understand the beliefs legal populations and members of the community have about inattentional blindness, and their general familiarity and experience with the concept. Australian police officers (n = 94) and lawyers (n = 98), along with psychology students (n = 99) and community members (n = 100) completed a survey where they: a) stated whether an individual would have noticed an event in six legal vignettes, b) rated whether factors would make an individual more, less, or just as likely to notice an unexpected event, c) reported their familiarity with and personal experiences of inattentional blindness, and d) indicated whether they believed individuals could make themselves more likely to notice unexpected events. Respondents in all populations frequently responded "yes" to detecting the unexpected event in most legal vignettes. They also held misconceptions about some factors (expertise and threat) that would influence the noticing of unexpected events. Additionally, personal experiences with inattentional blindness were commonly reported. Finally, respondents provided strategies for what individuals can do to make themselves more likely to notice of unexpected events, despite a lack of evidence to support them. Overall, these findings provide direction for where education and training could be targeted to address misconceptions about inattentional blindness held by legal populations, which may lead to improved decision-making in legal settings.

The effects of episode spacing on adult's reports of a repeated event.

Witnesses' reports of repeated events have been the focus of much research; however, the spacing interval between each episode of the event has differed greatly. The aim of the current study was to determine whether spacing interval affects participants' memory reports. Adults (N = 217) watched one (n = 52) or four videos depicting workplace bullying. The repeated event participants watched the four videos all in one day (n = 55), one per day over four consecutive days (n = 60), or one every three days over 12 days (n = 50). One week after the last (or only) video, participants reported on that video and answered some reflective questions about the procedure. Repeated-event participants also reported on what usually happens across the videos. Single-event participants reported proportionally more accurate information about the target video than repeated-event participants, and spacing interval did not affect repeated event participants' accuracy. However, accuracy scores were close to ceiling while errors rates were at floor levels, preventing us from drawing strong conclusions. We found some evidence that episode spacing affected participants' perceptions of their memory performance. Overall, spacing may have a minimal effect on adults' memory for repeated events, but further research is required.

Laypeople's perceptions of the effects of event repetition, reporting delay, and emotion on children's and adults' memory.

For crimes such as child abuse and family violence, jurors' assessments of memory reports from key witnesses are vital to case outcomes in court. Since jurors are not experts on memory, the present research measured laypeople's (i.e., non-experts') beliefs about how three key factors affect witnesses' memory reports for an experienced event: how frequently an event was experienced (repeated, single), the delay between experiencing and reporting the event, and the emotional valence of the event. Across two studies, lay participants completed an online survey that measured their beliefs about each factor. In Study 1, 51 participants completed a survey about how the three factors affect children's memory. In Study 2, another 51 participants completed a survey about how the three factors affect adult's memory. Across both studies, delays were believed to worsen memory, and emotion was believed to improve memory. Beliefs about single and repeated events showed different patterns across the studies. In Study 1, participants' beliefs about children's memory for repeated experience were variable. In Study 2, participants believed that adults' memory was worse for repeated events than single events. Overall, laypeople demonstrated many accurate beliefs about memory, but showed some confusion about children's memory for repeated events.

Adult memory for instances of emotionally stressful and non-stressful repeated events.

Repeated offences, such as domestic violence, are often distressing for victims. When victims of such offences make an allegation of abuse, they are usually required to report details about specific incidents. Therefore, this pre-registered study examined whether memory for an emotionally stressful versus non-stressful repeated event would differ depending on the instance being recalled. Eighty female participants (Mage = 22.3, SD = 7.4) imagined being involved in four abusive (emotionally stressful repeated event) or non-abusive relationship instances (non-stressful repeated event) over a four-week period. One-week after the last instance, participants completed recall and source memory questions about each instance. We found no evidence that memory for stressful versus non-stressful repeated events differed depending on the instance being recalled. Instead, we found that memory was more accurate for the last instance relative to the other instances (i.e., recency effect), regardless of event stressfulness. We also found that memory accuracy was better across all instances in the stressful than the non-stressful group. The findings suggest that victim-survivors of abuse might find the last instance of abuse particularly memorable when the delay between the offence and report is one-week or less, and the stressfulness of the instance might help them recall more details.

Does experiencing inattentional blindness for crime influence eyewitness recall?

Witnesses may not notice crimes occurring when their attention is elsewhere, which may affect their memory. In this study, 174 participants completed an attention-demanding task while viewing a video containing an assault. Whether participants noticed the assault or experienced inattentional blindness for it was assessed. Then, participants were exposed to post-event information (containing misinformation) before completing a cued-recall task under one of three recall instructions (free, forced, or no instruction). Most participants experienced inattentional blindness for the assault (65.5%), which had a negative effect on recall, regardless of recall instruction. Specifically, participants who experienced inattentional blindness were less confident, complete, and accurate, and were more likely to report misinformation, than participants who noticed the crime. Witnesses who experienced inattentional blindness reported that they relied purely on post-event information to answer some questions. The findings suggest that caution should be taken when interviewing witnesses who have not paid attention to a crime.

Stopping crime? The effect of crime re-enactments on eyewitness memory.

Crime re-enactments broadcast on television encourage witnesses to provide information regarding unsolved crimes. However, given that eyewitness memory can be altered through exposure to post-event information, it is possible that crime re-enactments may influence the memory of eyewitnesses. The current studies examined the effects of crime re-enactments on eyewitness memory. In two experiments (Experiment 1 with a distractor task, Experiment 2 without a distractor task), participants were shown one of three versions of a crime video that differed in their ambiguity. One week later half of the participants viewed a crime re-enactment. All participants then completed a guided free- and cued-recall task regarding the original event. Across both studies, exposure to the re-enactment did not improve eyewitness memory; instead, participants who viewed the re-enactment were more likely to accept the misinformation in the re-enactment. The findings shed light on potential issues with using crime re-enactments to elicit eyewitness accounts.

Adult memory for specific instances of a repeated event: a preliminary review.

In cases of repeated victimisation, a complainant's statement of abuse, and therefore memory, is often critical evidence for forensic investigations and legal proceedings. It is therefore important to understand the functioning of adults' memory for repeated events. As such, the purpose of this paper was to review the extant literature on adult memory for instances of a repeated event. The results of the review revealed a small number of heterogeneous studies on adult repeated-event memory (N = 12). The literature so far shows that while adults might have difficulty in recalling information specific to instances (narrow accuracy), they are capable of remembering information across multiple instances (broad accuracy). It was also found that several factors may impact recall of instances including age, the number of experienced instances, rehearsing an event, repeated retrieval and event distinctiveness. The discussion highlights the forensic implications of this research and future research directions.

Adult memory for instances of a repeated emotionally stressful event: does retention interval matter?

This pre-registered study examined the impact of different retention intervals on remembering each instance of an emotionally stressful, repeated event. Eighty-nine adult female participants imagined being a victim of four similar domestic violence instances over a four-week period. Participants then completed recall and recognition memory questions about each instance either immediately, one-week, or three-weeks after the final instance. Overall, the findings showed that memory performance was often most accurate for the first and last instance compared to the middle instances. That is, participants reported more correct information, made fewer memory errors, and had better quality memory reports for the first and last instances compared to the middle instances. However, following a short delay (i.e., no delay and one-week), participants reported more correct information and were better at discriminating between correct and false details for the last instance relative to the others instances, while at a longer delay (i.e., three-weeks), more correct information was recalled for the first instance compared to other instances (there was no effect for memory discrimination). These findings suggest that memory for instances of a repeated event can depend on the position of an instance, and under some circumstances, the retention interval.

The effects of repeatedly recalling a traumatic event on eyewitness memory and suggestibility.

The aims of this study were to examine the effects of repeatedly recalling a traumatic event on recall performance and eyewitness suggestibility. We also investigated whether these effects were moderated by the type of details recalled and the completeness of retrieval. Participants watched a video depicting a fatal car accident and were randomly allocated to one of four conditions in which they: (1) repeatedly recalled the traumatic (central) details of the event only (trauma-focused); (2) repeatedly recalled the non-traumatic (peripheral) details of the event only (non-trauma focused); (3) repeatedly recalled the entire video (complete); or (4) did not recall the video at all (no-recall control). Results indicated that repeated complete recall was beneficial for memory retention of the entire traumatic event and that, in general, trauma-related (central) post-event information (PEI) was less likely to be reported than trauma-unrelated (peripheral) PEI. It was also found that repeated trauma-focused recall increased trauma-related confabulations. These results not only illustrate the value of repeated complete recall to best preserve the integrity of eyewitness memory, but, perhaps more critically, warn of the dangers of repeatedly questioning witnesses specifically about the central or traumatic details of an event.

Who is the Usual Suspect? Evidence of a Selection Bias Toward Faces That Make Direct Eye Contact in a Lineup Task.

The speed and ease with which we recognize the faces of our friends and family members belies the difficulty we have recognizing less familiar individuals. Nonetheless, overconfidence in our ability to recognize faces has carried over into various aspects of our legal system; for instance, eyewitness identification serves a critical role in criminal proceedings. For this reason, understanding the perceptual and psychological processes that underlie false identification is of the utmost importance. Gaze direction is a salient social signal and direct eye contact, in particular, is thought to capture attention. Here, we tested the hypothesis that differences in gaze direction may influence difficult decisions in a lineup context. In a series of experiments, we show that when a group of faces differed in their gaze direction, the faces that were making eye contact with the participants were more likely to be misidentified. Interestingly, this bias disappeared when the faces are presented with their eyes closed. These findings open a critical conversation between social neuroscience and forensic psychology, and imply that direct eye contact may (wrongly) increase the perceived familiarity of a face.

Faces in Context: Does Face Perception Depend on the Orientation of the Visual Scene?

The mechanisms held responsible for familiar face recognition are thought to be orientation dependent; inverted faces are more difficult to recognize than their upright counterparts. Although this effect of inversion has been investigated extensively, researchers have typically sliced faces from photographs and presented them in isolation. As such, it is not known whether the perceived orientation of a face is inherited from the visual scene in which it appears. Here, we address this question by measuring performance in a simultaneous same-different task while manipulating both the orientation of the faces and the scene. We found that the face inversion effect survived scene inversion. Nonetheless, an improvement in performance when the scene was upside down suggests that sensitivity to identity increased when the faces were more easily segmented from the scene. Thus, while these data identify congruency with the visual environment as a contributing factor in recognition performance, they imply different mechanisms operate on upright and inverted faces.