Suchergebnisse

Abstract: In England and Wales, criminal convictions continue to be secured on the basis of identification evidence alone. The Devlin Report (1976) concluded that the process of identification was inherently fallible and recommended that such prosecutions should cease save in exceptional circumstances. Devlin also called for more psychological research on the identification process. Examples of such research are reviewed, together with cases of actual or alleged mistaken identification which exemplify the principles uncovered by this work. It is concluded that until Devlin's central recommendation is carried into law, miscarriages of justice based on mistaken identity are likely to continue to bedevil the English legal system.

SUMMARY.This paper summarises recent attempts to safeguard children's welfare in the courtroom. Drawing on international research and practice developments, the paper compares programmes that prepare children for their role as witnesses with reforms designed toprotectchildren once they testify. Benefits and disadvantages associated with both approaches are highlighted, and the paper concludes that all professionals have a responsibility to promote children's welfare in the courtroom.

"Forensic Psychology is a broad and growing area of psychological research and practice. It embraces a variety of studies at the interface of psychology and the law, spanning both legal and criminological issues. The legal aspect of forensic psychology concerns the application of psychological knowledge and methods to the processes of law and the criminological aspect deals with the application of psychological theory and method to the understanding (and reduction) of criminal behaviour through interventions. Hence, the legal aspect deals with evidence, witnesses and the courts; while the criminological aspect focuses on crime and perpetrators"--

SUMMARY. An experiment was conducted to examine whether the use of different camera shots‐medium or close‐up‐affected the way in which child witnesses were perceived by adult raters. School children were video‐recorded describing an event in which they had participated, and students rated the children s perceived credibility on a number of scales. Type of shot used did not influence perceived credibility in a consistent manner, although it did influence some aspects of a child's credibility when the child's age and/or sex was taken into account. Children seen in medium shot were judged more honest than children seen in close‐up. Age of the child was the most influential factor, with older children generally perceived as more credible than younger children; this effect was particularly noticeable for girls and children seen in medium shot. The relevance of the current study for the testimony of child witnesses is discussed in the light of current and proposed legal reforms.

SUMMARY. This article uses a research study on decisions about children's truth telling to discuss the difficult issues involved in using video‐taped evidence in child abuse cases. The adult raters had to decide whether each child recounting a school trip was telling the truth or had only seen a video recording of the day's events. Raters were just above chance in detecting truth and deception, were better able to detect truth tellers than deceivers, and were more successful in decoding deceptive behaviour presented by boys and younger children. Most accuracy‐confidence relationships were not significant.

Twenty white and 20 black encoders each made Photofit constructions from memory of one of a sample of 10 white faces and one of a sample of 10 black faces. Then, to provide accuracy indices, two different groups of 20 white decoders matched the resulting Photofits to photographs of the original 20 faces. Both white and black encoders made more accurate white than black Photofits; white encoders made more accurate white Photofits than did black encoders; however, there were no racial differences in accuracy among encoders for black faces. Results were explained by cross-racial memory and by Photofit Kit differences.