Robot inquisition keeps witnesses on the right track
Memory is a strange and very impressionable thing. Police constantly run into problems with witnesses recalling potential crimes, and must carefully choose their words when interviewing so as not to influence the witnesses’ recounting of events. This issue, known as the misinformation effect, refers to the influence of using intense words during questioning of witnesses. One such example is using “smash” rather than “bump” or “hit” in cases of car accidents, which actually causes witnesses to report higher speeds and more serious damage. But what happens when a robot asks the questions? Mississippi State University tested this phenomenon by conducting an interview with two separate groups: one with a human and the other with a robot, controlled in a Wizard of Oz like set-up. When asked by a human interviewer, the questions caused the accuracy of witness recall to drop by 40 percent, whereas the questions posed by the robot interviewer had no effect.
Sourced from forensicweek.com
Citation:
Hodson, H. New Scientist . Robot inquisition keeps witnesses on the right track. Retrieved February 9, 2013, from http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21729036.100-robot-inquisition-keeps-witnesses-on-the-right-track.html?cmpid=RSS|NSNS|2012-GLOBAL|crime-and-forensics
