Eyes, Nose or Personality? How Different Descriptions Influence Facial Memory and Confidence Levels.
Document Type
Conference Proceeding
Publication Date
4-2025
Abstract
Some eyewitnesses only get a fleeting glance of the perpetrator’s face before describing it to police and identifying that person from a lineup. 120 participants viewed a series of faces, one at a time, and performed a task after each face was removed from the screen. We included one between-participants factor of encoding task (featural description, trait description, or counting) and one within-participants factor of encoding duration (2 vs. 6 s). Then, participants completed a self-paced recognition test by providing a yes/no recognition decision and confidence judgment (1 “not at all confident” to 3 “very confident”) for 48 faces (24 studied, 24 new). Trait descriptions improved accuracy at 2s, whereas featural descriptions improved accuracy at 6s. Confidence ratings varied by task but showed no interaction with duration. Understanding how encoding tasks and durations influence memory can inform best practices for eliciting eyewitness descriptions and designing training protocols for law enforcement.
Recommended Citation
Zertuche, Amanda, "Eyes, Nose or Personality? How Different Descriptions Influence Facial Memory and Confidence Levels." (2025). Student Research Symposium 2025. 27.
https://digitalcommons.tamusa.edu/srs_2025/27
Comments
Poster Session 1
3:30-5:00 p.m.
BLH Lobby