Eyewitness Memory Of Police Trainees For Realistic Role Plays
Acknowledgment:
This research was supported in part by a grant to John C. Yuille from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada. We would like to thank Patricia Tollestrup for her assistance in the analysis of the results. We also express our appreciation to the staff and trainees of the Metropolitan Police Training Centre in Hendon, England.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to: John C. Yuille, Department of Psychology, University of British Columbia, 2136 West Mall, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, V6T 1Z4.
As with any new area of scientific inquiry, the first century of eyewitness memory research (e.g., Binet, 1900) has been characterized by debate and an evolution of method. During the past decade, the debate over the ecological validity of the research has taken center stage, as it did in the early part of this century (cf. Wigmore, 1909). The current version of this debate (e.g., Loftus, 1991; Yuille & Wells, 1991) focuses on the relationship between memory as it operates in the laboratory and memory in other contexts. Some have argued that memory is best studied in the laboratory where maximum control and precision are possible (e.g., Banaji & Crowder, 1989). Although there are several problems associated with this argument (see commentaries edited by Loftus, 1991), one salient problem is the inability to produce certain circumstances in the laboratory. For example, for obvious ethical reasons, strong emotional reactions or high levels of stress can no longer be induced in laboratories. Anyone interested in the relationship between emotions or stress and memory must, at some point, leave the laboratory to seek research venues in which such reactions occur naturally.
This article reports the results of our first study of eyewitness memory at a police-training college in Hendon, England, Probationer constables of the London Metropolitan Police Force...
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