Greene Ciara M, Brassil Maryanne, Murphy Gillian
School of Psychology, University College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland.
School of Applied Psychology, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland.
Sci Rep. 2025 Jul 29;15(1):27693. doi: 10.1038/s41598-025-13587-y.
Autobiographical memories can be easily distorted by post-event misinformation, a finding with significant implications for justice and the judicial system. Although everyone is susceptible to misinformation effects, the discussion of this issue in judicial contexts is typically focused on the memory of the complainant, but not the accused. Across three experiments, we exposed participants (total N = 1341) to a first-person perspective video depicting the events leading up to an alleged sexual assault, and assigned them to the role of complainant or accused. There was no difference in the susceptibility of participants in the complainant and accused roles to post-event misinformation, even when it was compatible with their account of events. We conclude that the complainant and accused in a "he said, she said" case are equally likely to suffer from memory distortion, and urge expert witnesses to take this into account when providing testimony.
自传体记忆很容易因事后错误信息而扭曲，这一发现对司法和司法系统具有重大影响。尽管每个人都容易受到错误信息效应的影响，但在司法背景下对这个问题的讨论通常集中在投诉人的记忆上，而不是被告的记忆上。在三项实验中，我们让参与者（总共N = 1341）观看了一段以第一人称视角呈现的视频，视频描绘了一起涉嫌性侵犯事件发生前的事件，并将他们分配到投诉人或被告的角色。投诉人和被告角色的参与者对事后错误信息的易感性没有差异，即使该错误信息与他们对事件的描述相符。我们得出结论，在“他说，她说”的案件中，投诉人和被告同样有可能遭受记忆扭曲，并敦促专家证人在提供证词时考虑到这一点。
