Why Do People Make Errors in Eyewitness Testimony? • 229operate on a more subtle level. Consider the following situation. A witness to a crime
is looking through a one-way window at a lineup of six men standing on a stage. The
police offi cer says, “Which one of these men did it?” What is wrong with this question?
The problem with the police offi cer’s question is that it carries the implication that the
crime perpetrator is in the lineup. This suggestion increases the chances that the witness
will pick someone, perhaps using the following type of reasoning: “Well, the guy with the
beard looks more like the robber than any of the other men, so that’s probably the one.”
Of course, looking like the robber and actually being the robber may be two different
things, so the result may be identifi cation of an innocent man. A better way of presenting
the task is to let the witness know that the crime suspect may or may not be in the lineup.
Here is another situation, taken from a transcript of an actual criminal case, in
which suggestion could have played a role.Eyewitness to a crime on viewing a lineup: “Oh, my God.... I don’t know.... It’s one of
those two... but I don’t know.... Oh, man... the guy a little bit taller than number two....
It’s one of those two, but I don’t know.”
Eyewitness 30 minutes later, still viewing the lineup and having diffi culty making a
decision: “I don’t know... number two?”
Offi cer administering lineup: “Okay.”
Months later... at trial: “You were positive it was number two? It wasn’t a maybe?”
Answer from eyewitness: “There was no maybe about it.... I was absolutely positive.”
(Wells & Bradfi eld, 1998)The problem with this scenario is that the police offi cer’s response of “okay” may have
infl uenced the witness to think that he or she had correctly identifi ed the suspect. Thus, theView film of
female teacher
getting
robbed.Test:
Pick robber
from
photospread.View film of
female teacher
reading to
students.View film of
male teacher
reading to
students.(a)(b) (c)EC604020Percent identified male teacher^0 EC604020Percent identified male teacher^0
Actual robber
was in
photospreadActual robber
not in
photospreadExperimentalControl●FIGURE 8.20 (a) Design of Ross
et al.’s (1994) experiment on the
eff ect of familiarity on eyewitness
testimony. (b) When the actual
robber was not in the photospread,
the male teacher was erroneously
identifi ed as the robber 60 percent of
the time. (c) When the actual robber
was in the photospread, the male
teacher was erroneously identifi ed
less than 20 percent of the time.
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