Essay
Influence of anxiety on eye witness testimony (EWT)
Psychology A Level AQA Essay Plan. Information taken directly from the textbook and displayed in an essay format, for AO1 and AO3.
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Influence of anxiety on EWT:AO1 BRIEF: 2 marks
AO3: 1-3 marks
Anxiety creates physiological arousal in the body, diverting our
Aicore
attention from important cues and worsening recall. A study into There are potentially many ethical issues with purposely creating
this looked at effects of weapons on recall accuracy. Participants in anxiety in participants. This is because it may subject people to
a waiting room heard an argument next door. In the ‘low anxiety’ psychological harm purely for research purposes. Therefore, real-
condition, a man walked into the room holding a pen with grease life studies are beneficial as psychologists’ interview people who
on his hands. Other participants overheard the same argument, but have already witnessed a real life event, rather than creating the
also heard the sound of breaking glass. They then saw a man with a situation themselves. Despite this issue not challenging the findings
paper knife covered in blood – this was the ‘high-anxiety’ condition. from the weapon focus study, it importantly raises the question of
Later, the participants picked out the man from a set of photos. the need for such research. This is due to the fact that we can
49% of those who saw the man with the pen identified him, obtain our findings from people who have already experienced
compared to 33% in the high-anxiety condition. anxiety, rather than imposing it on other unnecessarily.
AO1 EXPLAIN: 4 marks AO3: 4-6 marks
The stress of witnessing a crime creates anxiety, triggering the As well as this, the weapon focus effect may not be entirely
‘fight or flight’ response. This increases our alertness, making us relevant; some say that it is a test of surprise, instead of anxiety.
more aware of cues in the situation, consequently improving our This suggests that the reason participants focus on the weapon
memory of the event. A study into a gun shooting took place where may be because they are surprised at what they are seeing, rather
recall of the event took place both immediately after the event and than being scared. For example, a study was carried out where
5 months later. These were compared, and accuracy was participants watched a video in a hairdressing salon and a variety
determined by the number of details reported in each account. of objects appeared. Eyewitness accuracy was found to be
Witnesses also gave a stress rating at the time and were asked significantly worse in the high unusualness conditions, which
about any emotional problems since the event. The findings suggests that the weapon focus effect is due to unusualness rather
showed little change in recall accuracy after 5 months (the only than anxiety. Therefore, this means that the weapon focus effect
differences were minor), and showed that those with the highest does not specifically tell us anything about the effects of anxiety
stress levels were most accurate. on eyewitness testimony.
AO1 DISCUSS – 6 marks AO3: 7-8 marks
The Yerkes Dodson Law can be applied to eye witness Researchers often interview eyewitnesses a while after the event
testimony to explain these contradictory findings. Lower levels has taken place, meaning that lots of things will have happened
of anxiety produce lower levels of recall accuracy, but memory in the participant’s life during this time that are uncontrollable.
becomes more accurate as the level of anxiety experienced Examples of this include discussions with people about the event,
increases. However, it reaches a point where the optimum level information seen in the media, the effects of being interviewed
of anxiety is reached – the maximum accuracy. This means that by the police etc. Therefore, this lack of control is a limitation of
if an eyewitness experiences any more stress than this, then field studies, as there is a possibility that these extraneous
their recall of the event suffers a drastic decline. variables may be responsible for recall accuracy. Due to this, the
effects of anxiety may be overwhelmed by these factors, making
it impossible to assess the participants by the time they are
interviewed.
Notes: AO3: 9-10 marks
A further limitation is that the Inverted-U explanation – the
Yerkes Dodson Law – is too simplistic. Anxiety is very difficult to
define and measure accurately as it consists of many elements;
cognitive, behavioural, emotional and physical. The Yerkes
Dodson Law assumes that only physiological arousal is linked to
poor performance, and therefore ignores all of the other factors
of anxiety. Because of this, the Inverted-U explanation is an
incomplete explanation of how anxiety affects EWT, as there is
likely to be more to the relationship between anxiety and EWT
than simply physiological arousal.
Word count: AO1 – 316, AO3 – 417, Total - 733
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