Do memory experts agree on how stress affects eyewitness testimony?

Details

This survey examined experts’ and laypeople’s beliefs about statements concerning stress effects on eyewitness memory. Thirty-seven eyewitness memory experts, 36 fundamental memory experts, and 109 laypeople agreed, disagreed, or selected “don’t know” for statements about stress during encoding and retrieval.

The researchers examined proportions within each group and compared eyewitness with fundamental memory experts, and experts with laypeople, both for agreement versus disagreement and for “don’t know” versus agreement or disagreement. High proportions of experts in both fields agreed that very high stress impairs the accuracy of eyewitness testimony. A majority of fundamental memory experts, but not eyewitness memory experts, endorsed the idea that stress during encoding can enhance memory. Responses about moderating factors, including stressor severity and the type of detail, provided further insight into this discrepancy.

Eyewitness memory experts selected “don’t know” more often than fundamental memory experts for neuroscientific statements about stress effects on memory, although such responses were substantial in both expert groups. Laypeople’s responses to eight statements differed statistically from expert answers on topics including memory in children and professionals such as police officers, memory for faces and short crimes, and the existence of repression; these differences offered insight into possible “commonsense” beliefs about stress and memory.

The findings reflect the current state of knowledge as represented by this sample of experts and laypeople, and highlight areas where further research and consensus would be valuable.