ABSTRACT To determine if suboptimal procedures were used in a prior eyewitness identification, defense attorneys often ask witnesses at a deposition to recall those procedures. However, it is unknown whether witnesses can accurately do so. At Time 1,190 undergraduate student‐participants viewed a mock crime and a subsequent lineup. They received either biased or unbiased pre‐lineup instructions and either confirming or no post‐identification feedback. One week later at Time 2, they were asked whether they received biased instructions/post‐identification feedback at Time 1 with either non‐leading questions or leading questions that suggested suboptimal procedures occurred or did not occur. Witnesses exhibited poor memory for pre‐lineup instructions but strong memory for feedback, consistent with the self‐reference effect. However, leading questions disrupted accurate recall of instructions and (to a lesser extent) feedback. These findings suggest that eyewitness reports of prior lineup procedures can be inaccurate and influenced by questioning style, potentially undermining assessments of witness reliability.
Hunter et al. (Fri,) studied this question.