| Abstract: | In two studies we examined the effect of questioner expertise on the error rates of subjects who were asked misleading versus unbiased questions. A total of 105 introductory psychology students watched a videotaped clip of a bank robbery and were then questioned about the crime. The questioner was represented to subjects as either highly knowledgeable or completely naive about the events the subject witnessed. One half of the subjects in each expertise condition were asked misleading questions, and the other half were asked unbiased questions. In the knowledgeable questioner conditions, misleading questions were associated with error rates significantly higher than those obtained with the unbiased questions (p?ns). These results indicate that misleading questions decrease witness accuracy when the questioner is assumed to be knowledgeable about the crime, but have no effect on accuracy when the questioner is assumed to be naive. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved) |
