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TOK - How reliable is an 'eye witness account' as a primary source?
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How reliable is "eye witness account" as a primary source of information?
What is a "primary source"?
Primary source is a term used in a number of disciplines to describe source material that is closest to the person, information, period, or idea being studied.
What is an "eye witness account"?
A person present at an event who can describe what happened
Real life event
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9dm42_XaXrI&feature=related
No DNA evidence
How can we tell if eye witness testimony is reliable?
Is there evidence to back it up?
Has anybody else witnessed the event?
The situation itself.
Involved personally.
If the person was involved personally, this may affect their judgement or they may be specifically biased.
Timescale
Media
State of eye witness.
Were they prompted? (Asked to be a witness)
Limiting Factors
Perception
- Age
Studies show that elderly people are less reliable in recalling information
(Karpel et al 2001)
Young adults (17 - 25) and older adults (65 - 85) were shown a video of a robbery.
They were then asked to recall what they'd seen.
This information was then compared.
The information given by the young adults was more accurate and they were less vulnerable to leading questions.
Language
Using video clips of car crashes, Loftus and Palmer (1974) attempted to show how something as simple as changing the verb in a sentence (how fast were the cars going when they ____ each other) could influence a participants memory of an incident.
Verb Mean estimate of speed (mph)
Smashed 40.8
Collided 39.3
Bumped 38.1
Hit 34.0
Contacted 31.8
When people were asked a week after viewing the film whether they saw any broken glass at the scene (there was none), people in the smashed group were more likely to say yes. Therefore, a leading question that encouraged them to remember the vehicles going faster also encouraged them to remember that they saw non-existent broken glass
Conclusion
As a primary source, EWT is not entirely reliable.
"Eyewitness Misidentification Testimony was a factor in 75% of post-conviction DNA exoneration cases in the US, making it the leading cause of these wrongful convictions".
Although EWT is not entirely reliable, it is quite valuable in the way that it can recreate a scene. However EWT should not solely be used to convict suspects, only used when in conjunction with accurate evidence eg. DNA sampling, CCTV footage.
worthy.
Coverage
- Leading Questions