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Means, SDs, and 95% Confidence Intervals (CIs) for Correct and Incorrect Items Reported and Accuracy Rate by Experimental Group Active Officers Observer Officers
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Investigations after critical events often depend on accurate and detailed recall accounts from operational witnesses (e.g., law enforcement officers, military personnel, and emergency responders). However, the challenging, and often stressful, nature of such events, together with the cognitive demands imposed on operational witnesses as a function...
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As previous research suggested, Weapon Focus Effect (WFE) occurs when during a crime a weapon is present, and as a result it usually reduces the reliability of eyewitness identification decisions (Saunders, 2009). The current study aims to examine the relationship of WFE with eyewitness’ memory for perpetrators’ physical characteristics as well as...
Citations
... Previous studies have investigated the effects of various information gathering techniques in the eyewitness context and the impact of stressful situations on the memory of police officers [20][21][22][23]. However, our present study adopts a unique approach. ...
... Although the sample size did not reach the optimal level (due to the small number of trained officers and operational commitments), it still provided reasonable statistical power for an applied study, and the results should be interpreted in light of this limitation. This limitation in cohort sizes has been noted in previous studies involving specialist police personnel [22,24]. ...
Police officers often face critical incidents involving armed offenders, requiring the use of force to ensure safety. Eyewitness accounts, including those from officers, are crucial in the justice system but can be unreliable. Techniques such as self-authored statements and structured interviews are used to gather information, but their efficacy in high-stress situations is unclear. Previous research suggests that heightened arousal during memory encoding enhances recall, particularly for central details. This study compares recall methods (statements vs. interviews) for police officers in high-stress versus no-stress situations, focusing on central and peripheral event details. Officers participated in a simulated high-stress incident, providing memory data through both methods. Overall, no significant difference was found in memory scores between the techniques. However, analysis revealed significant differences favoring structured interviews for peripheral information. Recall that central information remained consistent across methods. These findings highlight the need for careful methodology when examining memories formed in stressful contexts.
... Furthermore, sleep following such an incident prioritizes memory consolidation of central and negative details at the cost of neutral or peripheral details (Payne et al., 2012;Denis et al., 2022). As a result, the importance of interviewing victims immediately after the crime, but also following several sleep opportunities, is attracting attention by both victim and law-enforcement organizations (Hope et al., 2016;Campbell, 2022). ...
Testimonial evidence in the form of verbal accounts by victims, witnesses, and suspects plays a critical role in investigations and judicial proceedings, often serving as the only evidence during a trial. The psychological nature of testimonies causes this form of evidence to be inherently limited, motivating psycho-legal scholars to identify both risk factors and solutions necessary to improve its reliability. To this end, the current perspective argues that sleep-related fatigue is a formative factor that influences the fidelity of statements and confessions provided during legal interactions. Specifically, it considers the prevalence of sleep disruption among subjects interacting with the criminal justice system, its likely impact on memory of victims and witnesses, and the role of sleep deprivation in confessions. In view of legal doctrines relevant to both evidentiary and constitutional considerations, this analysis is meant to motivate future work at the intersection of sleep-related fatigue and legal processes.
... The high stress experienced by an officer participating in a lethal force situation is also likely to be associated with perceptual distortion. This has been reported in controlled studies with officers tasked with responding to (a) a live simulated scenario involving a weapon (Hope et al., 2016), (b) an active shooter scenario (Alpert et al., 2012) and (c) a virtual reality simulation with a 'shoot/no-shoot' scenario (Stanny & Johnson, 2000). 5 On a related point, it might be argued that memory for an event is more accurate when people actively participate in the event than when they simply witness a video of it. ...
... 5 On a related point, it might be argued that memory for an event is more accurate when people actively participate in the event than when they simply witness a video of it. However, Hope et al. (2016) reported that officers who participated in a scenario reported fewer correct details about the critical phase of the scenario than those who simply observed it. Similar results with measures of memory accuracy were reported by Ihlebaek et al. (2003) and Kassin (1984). ...
... The above comparisons between the pattern of responses for officers who participated live versus online also presents a test of the stress mechanism to account for the results in Experiment 1. Officers who participated live would be predicted to have experienced a higher level of stress than those who participated online. 23 This is consistent with results reported by Hope et al. (2016) in which police officers serving as active witnesses to a stressful use-of-force simulation exhibited higher measures of heart rate and heart rate variabilityreflecting higher levels of stressthan officers serving as observer witnesses. Nonetheless, as indicated above, in Experiment 2, for 8 of the 11 questions, there was no significant differences in responses between these two groups of officers, failing to support the stress mechanism to account for the results of Experiment 1. ...
... For example, at the earliest stages of an event, stress-induced attentional and perceptual narrowing, including tunnel vision and diminished sound, can influence and distort what is initially encoded into memory (Davis & Loftus, 2009;Di Nota et al., 2020). While attentional and perceptual narrowing may enhance recall of the central features of an event, this may be at the expense of memory for peripheral details (Eysenck et al., 2007;Hope et al., 2016). Indeed, studies of officers involved in actual (e.g., Artwohl, 2002) and simulated Hope et al., 2016;Hope et al., 2012) shooting incidents have reported significant memory deficits, including memory loss and distortions (e.g., seeing, hearing, or experiencing something that did not happen). ...
... While attentional and perceptual narrowing may enhance recall of the central features of an event, this may be at the expense of memory for peripheral details (Eysenck et al., 2007;Hope et al., 2016). Indeed, studies of officers involved in actual (e.g., Artwohl, 2002) and simulated Hope et al., 2016;Hope et al., 2012) shooting incidents have reported significant memory deficits, including memory loss and distortions (e.g., seeing, hearing, or experiencing something that did not happen). ...
... Perceptions may be differentiated only under circumstances of actual engagement in such situations (c.f. Hope et al., 2016). Such findings would clarify officer expectations about subject behaviors under stress and contribute to officer training related to cultural influences affecting the interpretation of aggressive displays (Kahn et al., 2018). ...
... Thus, the acute stress from an incident involving force may impair the officers' recall accuracy of the event. For example, Hope et al. (2016) found that officers who were actively responding during use of force simulations experienced higher arousal (i.e., stress) during the scenario relative to passive observers. Active responders (high arousal) had more errors when reporting post-simulation relative to passive observers (low arousal), suggesting that memory impairments may have been impacted by the arousal differences between the two conditions. ...
... Similar to previous use of force simulation research (e.g., Hope et al. 2016), a heart rate monitor was used to record officer's heart rate (HR) as a proxy measure of acute stress during the use of force encounter. Increases in HR are considered a reliable and objective index of psychological stress (Kim et al. 2018;Taelman et al. 2009). ...
One of the most salient and scrutinized issues in policing relates to the use of force (Alpert and Dunham 2004). Force encounters typically activate acute stress responses that may affect cognitive processes contributing to errors in recall of those events (Hope 2016) and influence the quality of reported information. Thus, the present study sought to examine the role of executive functions on use of force report quality. Participants included 84 Canadian municipal officers (71% Male; Mage = 40.56 years, SD = 8.40) who completed a self-report measure of executive function (BRIEF-A; Roth et al. 2005) and participated in a live action video-recorded use of force simulation. Officers provided a written narrative of their use of force experience immediately post-simulation. Videos and narratives were coded for officer and suspect behavioral actions to determine comparability between observed behaviors in the simulation and narratives. Results demonstrated that officers’ behaviors and their narratives were reasonably comparable, with the greatest comparability observed with details pertaining to officers’ own actions. Poorer metacognitive abilities were predictive of lower comparability for details pertaining to suspect behavior. Results are discussed in terms of policy amendments and training strategies to maximize the quality of official use of force reports.
... Interactive events may also be remembered differently. Hope et al. (2016) showed that active adult witnesses of a stressful situation reported significantly less accurate information than non-active observers. In some forensic situations, witnesses are passive viewers of an event, which may evoke different memory processes (e.g. Bates et al., 1999). ...
This study investigated the interaction between internal characteristics and external prompts (drawing and dramatisation) in children’s eyewitness recall. Eighty-one 3- to 6- year old children witnessed a live event involving an altercation between two actors in their schools. They were asked to tell what happened (Verbal condition), draw what happened while talking about it (Drawing condition), or show and tell by using gestures and mime (Dramatisation condition), one day, two weeks, and approximately six months after the event. Independent measures of temperament, mood, symbolic skills, and language ability were taken. Children in the Drawing condition reported significantly more details about objects than children in the Verbal condition after a two-week delay. Symbolic skills and shyness affected children’s recall. Our findings suggest that considering young children’s cognitive skills and temperamental traits may help facilitate their eyewitness recall.
... Officers should understand the difference between conducting a criminal investigation of the incident (i.e., who fired this shot?) and an analysis of the problem (i.e., why are shots being fired at this location?). In Cincinnati, the difference in responses might f In an experimental study of an active shooter incident, for example, roughly 20 percent of participants recalled seeing a firearm in the hands of the mock offender, even though the gun remained in the person's waistband (Hope et al., 2015 Locating shell casings or projectiles during the initial response is often difficult because shootings often occur at night. Good practice is therefore to return to the scene when visibility improves. ...
Monograph explores Acoustic Gunshot Detection Systems and best practices in law enforcement.
... Further, other scholars reviewed the laws pertaining to the use of deadly force among law enforcement officers (see Carbado, 2017;Fairley, 2019;Flanders & Welling, 2015;Garrison, 2018;Goodman, 2013;Holland, 2020;Johnson, 2017;Lee, 2018;Leider, 2018;Le Roux-Kemp & Horne, 2011;Loehr, 2018;Longo, 2011;Macfarlane, 2018;Marcus, 2016;Minner, 2019;Shah, 2018;Vandegrift & Connor, 2020); reviewed the limitations of police use of deadly force databases (see Alpert, 2016;Brucato, 2017;Fryer, 2018;Klinger, 2012;Koper, 2016;Lim, 2017;Murphy, 2016;Nix, 2020;White, 2016); reviewed prior literature on police use of deadly force (see Correll et al., 2014;Jones, 2017;Terrill, 2016;Zwach, 2015); examined and/or called for extensions of police use of deadly force policies (see Albrecht, 2011;Bruce, 2011;Engel et al., 2020;Katz, 2014;Klinger, 2020;Lee, 2016;Morrison & Garner, 2011;Nunes, 2015;Zimring, 2020); examined the collateral consequences of police use of deadly force (see Baker & Pillinger, 2020;Bor et al., 2018;Chaney & Robertson, 2015;Sewell et al., 2021); examined the negative effects of officer-involved shootings on police officers (see Broomé, 2014;Carson, 2014;Frankham, 2018;Komarovskaya et al. 2011); examined performance errors in police shootings (Lewinski et al., 2015;Taylor, 2019;Vickers & Lewinski, 2012); examined memory recall following officerinvolved shootings (see Hartman et al., 2017;Hope et al., 2016;Porter et al., 2019); and examined citizen perceptions of police use of deadly force (see Baker & Fidalgo, 2020;Culhane, 2016;Culhane & Schweitzer, 2018), among other topics. Figure 2 displays the number of published articles across the 10-years under examination. ...
The current study provides findings from a systematic review of the police use of deadly force literature over the most recently completed decade (2011–2020). After an exhaustive search of four scientific databases, 1,190 peer-reviewed articles related to the use of force were identified. Of these, 181 articles specifically examined deadly force, with 86 of them drawing on such force as the dependent variable. We found that the number of articles examining police use of deadly force increased dramatically over the course of the study period and encompassed a wide range of determinants of behavior. Citizen possession of a weapon continues to be the most consistent risk factor of police use of deadly force across decades of policing literature. Additionally, while many studies have attempted to examine the link between race and lethal force, a determination of such a relationship is difficult given both mixed findings and a lack of available national data.
... For example, with a specific focus on the recall of crimerelated details, Deffenbacher et al. (2004) reported a pattern just like the one observed with laboratory tasks-with high levels of stress impairing the accuracy of recall. Similarly, Hope et al. (2016) reported that stress impaired police officers' memory in critical incidents, again a finding in line with the laboratory data. A similar pattern has also been observed in other tasks outside the laboratory, with the high stress experienced in natural settings leading to longlasting memory for the "bare-bones" gist of the event, but impaired memory for other aspects of the event (e.g., Baker-Ward et al., 2009;Edelstein et al., 2004;Salmon et al., 2002). 2 Likewise, studies of how people remember horrifying events (like the attack on the World Trade Center in 2001; Hirst et al., 2015;Pezdek, 2003) document large numbers of substantial errors, again a finding contrary to the notion that stress and high emotion essentially "burn the event into the brain." ...
... The evidence suggests otherwise and shows that officers suffer perceptual and memory distortions when under stress, just as civilians do. This pattern has been documented in a variety of studies examining officers involved in highly realistic (and stressful) training exercises, including a live simulated scenario involving a weapon (Hope et al., 2016), an active shooter scenario (Rojek et al., 2012), a virtual reality simulation with a "shoot/no-shoot" scenario (Stanny & Johnson, 2000), and with Special Forces candidates following a vigorous prisoner of war exercise (Taverniers et al., 2013). ...
... On a related point, it might be argued that memory for a stressful event is more accurate for officers actively participating in the event than for people who are bystanders to it-perhaps because involvement somehow moderates the effects of stress. However, Hope et al. (2016) reported that officers who participated in an event actually reported fewer correct details about the critical phase of the event than those who simply observed it. ...
We consider six myths regarding mistaken beliefs about psychological processes (perception, memory, judgment) shaping legal evidence, and we offer research to debunk each. These myths include the idea that identification evidence provided by police officers is more reliable than similar evidence provided by civilians, that officers can reliably detect deception, that officers’ memories are not compromised by stress, and the claim that providing one sleep cycle after a use-of-force incident improves officers’ memories. We also consider cognitive mechanisms that contribute to the maintenance of these myths. In debunking the myths, we take on the more general issue of why myths related to cognitive processing in the real world should be addressed and suggest multiple vehicles for doing so. We consider both the benefits and the obstacles for each path, and end by suggesting a novel resource for debunking myths in the legal system.