Analysis Of Eyewitness

In a TedTalk concerning the dubious reliability of an eyewitness at the scene of a crime, forensic psychologist Scott Fraser explores the conviction of Francisco Carrillo and the fallible nature of the brain in encoding, storing, and retrieving memories. With the use of critical thinking and research based knowledge, discussed are the speaker’s claims, reactions to the talk, and a personal evaluation of eyewitness memory. As the forensic neurophysiologist in the case leading to Carrillo’s conviction, Fraser examines a fatal drive by shooting in California, and the eye-witness testimonies that had wrongfully placed an innocent man in prison. In reference to this case, the speaker argues that the memory of an eye-witness is inherently unreliable
During the retrieval process, memories are susceptible to influence and volatility by numerous other cognitive processes such as speculation, imagination, and other personal or outside beliefs. According to Myers and DeWall (2016), there is also a significant positive correlation between the frequency in retrieving the memory to the amount of change a memory may potentially sustain. For example, when an eyewitness is required to retrieve the memory of a crime numerous times, the story’s details are highly subject to change due to the numerous variables that oftentimes fill in the gaps of the fallible memory. In a study conducted by researcher Elizabeth Loftus, different faces were presented to a sample of individuals on a platform similar to that of a police lineup (Myers & DeWall, 2016). After mildly familiarizing her audience to the suspect’s face, Loftus then added two novel faces with similar characteristics. Upon seeing the actual suspect moments earlier, the majority of individuals had chosen the wrong picture (Myers & DeWall, 2016), thus reinforcing the substantial effect of reconstructed
Before starting the evaluation, I would request for the individuals to recount the memory of the suspect as little as possible prior to being interviewed. Due to the fact that information becomes more susceptible to outside influence the more it is retrieved from long-term to short-term memory (Myers & DeWall, 2016), this technique will aid the witness in retaining any truth inherent to the memory. Then after interviewing the eyewitnesses and recording their results, I would request that they return every day in the course of a week and recount the same memory to me again. Through the course of this week, I would record any changes to their story and evaluate my results. Similar to the research design that Fraser had implemented in granting Carrillo a retrial, I could also create a simulation of the scene and examine the factors that could have an effect on the witness’s ability to encode information inherent to the scene of the