Doctoral Dissertation Research:Using Mugshots to Improve Eyewitness Identification Accuracy

博士论文研究：利用面部照片提高目击者识别准确性

• 批准号: 0921761
• 负责人: Scott Gronlund
• 金额: $ 0.61万
• 依托单位: University of Oklahoma Norman Campus
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2009
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2009-06-15 至 2010-05-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0921761&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Doctoral; Dissertation; Research; Using; Mugshots

Recent advances in DNA testing have uncovered an alarming observation: innocent people are in prison and the guilty people that committed those crimes are at large. In the majority of the false conviction cases, faulty eyewitness identification is to blame. One standard police practice, showing witnesses mugshots of potential offenders (or people who may resemble them), accounts for some of these errors. This research identifies cases where the ability of an eyewitness to identify a perpetrator might be harmed or enhanced by the process of searching though a series of mugshots following the crime. Research has shown that witnesses who view mugshots may be less able to correctly identify the perpetrator of the crime. Moreover, witnesses can mistake individuals they view in a mugshot search for the perpetrator, even when subsequently presented with the actual perpetrator. From a memory and decision-making perspective, techniques are needed that avoid biasing a witness? memory, while at the same time aiding the police search for the culprit of the crime. This research includes an empirical exploration of the factors that produce lineup identification errors due to a prior exposure to a mugshot search and develops a formally-specified theoretical explanation for how these effects operate. In addition, new techniques designed to avoid these errors will be tested. This will allow us to develop better police practices for aiding a culprit search without harming the ability of the eyewitness to make an identification.

DNA测试的最新进展揭示了一个令人震惊的观察：无辜的人在监狱中，而犯有这些罪行的有罪人士都在整个监狱中。在大多数错误的定罪案件中，应归咎于目击者的身份错误。一项标准的警察执业表明，目击者涉及潜在犯罪者（或可能类似于他们的人）的拍摄者，涉及其中一些错误。这项研究确定了目击者识别肇事者的能力可能会因犯罪后的一系列照片而受到损害或增强。研究表明，观看照片的证人可能不太能够正确地识别犯罪的肇事者。此外，即使随后与实际的肇事者展示，证人可能会误认为他们在搜索肇事者中查看的个人。从记忆和决策的角度来看，需要避免偏见证人的技术吗？记忆，同时协助警察寻找犯罪的罪魁祸首。这项研究包括对由于事先暴露于Mugshot搜索而产生的阵容识别错误的因素的经验探索，并为这些效果如何运作开发了正式指定的理论解释。此外，将测试旨在避免这些错误的新技术。这将使我们能够制定更好的警察惯例，以帮助罪魁祸首搜查，而不会损害目击者的身份证明的能力。