Change Blindness and Eyewitness Testimony

ABSTRACT. The authors explored the relevance of research on change blindness to eye-witness identification and testimony under intentional and incidental memory conditions. Participants (N = 80, 40 men and 40 women) viewed a video enactment of a burglary in which the identity of the burglar changed at the halfway point of the film. Half of partici-pants were briefed to remember the content, and the other half were not. All were tested for the recall of the content, awareness of the change, and ability to identify either or both of the burglars. Some 61 % of participants did not notice the identity change. Rates of detec-tion were significantly higher in participants in the intentional condition, who also recalled significantly more detail from the film. Awareness of change was also significantly related to content recall scores and accuracy of identification of both burglars. The results illustrate the interrelation between the eyewitness and change blindness literatures