It has been theorised that when people witness crimes (especially violent and serious crimes), or are a victim of crime, the anxiety they feel at the time impacts their ability to accurately recall and recognise details of the crime or perpetrator when asked retrospectively. This obviously has huge implications for the criminal justice system given that witness/victim testimony and recognition play a huge role in identifying perpetrators and describing criminal events.
Valentine & Mescot tested this theory at the London Dungeons. There is a stage in the Dungeon experience where visitors walk through a passage and a man in a hooded robe with scars on his face jumps out at them at the same time a skeleton and a ghost appear. Valentine & Mescot asked visitors to complete a questionnaire at the end of the experience rating their anxiety levels during the experience. They also were asked to identify the man in the hooded robe out of 8 possible men wearing similar (but not identical) costumes. It is important to note that the visitors were unaware throughout the experience that they would be asked to identify the man at the end. It was discovered that the visitors who reported feeling the most anxious in the Dungeons were significantly less accurate at identifying the correct man in the hooded robe. This emphasises how difficult it can be for a victim or witness to identify a criminal and demonstrates the caution necessary to be taken when relying solely on witness/victim testimony.
This information was derived from The Psychologist magazine, volume 21.
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