Given the complexities of episodic memory and necessarily social nature of in-person face-to-face interviews, theoretical and evidence-based techniques for collecting episodic information from witnesses, victims, and survivors champion rapport-building. Rapport is believed to reduce some of the social demands of recalling an experienced event in an interview context, potentially increasing cognitive capacity for remembering. Cognitive and social benefits have also emerged in remote interview contexts with reduced anxiety and social pressure contributing to improved performance. Here, we investigated episodic memory in mock-eyewitness interviews conducted in virtual environments (VE) and in-person face-to-face (FtF), where rapport-building behaviours were either present or absent. Main effects revealed when rapport was present and where interviews were conducted in a VE participants recalled more correct event information, made fewer errors and were more accurate. Moreover, participants in the VE plus rapport-building present condition outperformed participants in all other conditions. Feedback indicated both rapport and environment were important for reducing the social demands of a recall interview, towards supporting effortful remembering. Our results add to the emerging literature on the utility of virtual environments as interview spaces and lend further support to the importance of prosocial behaviours in applied contexts.
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Despite varying operationalisations of rapport-building, there is consensus that some rapport-building behaviour is better than none for positive outcomes (e.g., College of Policing, 2018; Gabbert et al., 2021; Ministry of Justice, 2022; Milne & Bull, 1999; Nahouli et al., 2021; Nash et al., 2014; Nash et al., 2016; Walsh & Bull, 2012), although experimental research findings are mixed. Some research indicates witnesses can provide more complete and accurate accounts when rapport-building behaviours are present (e.g., R. Collins et al., 2002; Holmberg & Madsen, 2014; Nahouli et al., 2021; Nash et al., 2016; Vallano & Shreiber Compo, 2011; Novotny et al., 2021), but this is not always the case (see Kieckhaefer et al., 2014; Sauerland et al., 2018). For example, verbal rapport-building (unaccompanied by appropriate behaviours) has been found to increase information yield (e.g., Novotny et al., 2021), whereas some have reported that verbal behaviour alone is less effective (e.g., Nahouli et al., 2021). In a similar vein, extensive rapport-building (comprising both verbal and behavioural techniques), has been reported to improve recall performance (e.g., Collins et al., 2002; Kieckhaefer et al., 2014; Nahouli et al., 2021), while others have reported no positive impact (e.g., Meissner et al., 2015; Sauerland et al., 2018). A recent review of the use of rapport by professionals during interviews with witnesses and suspected offenders/persons of interest has indicated that some form of rapport does improve outcomes in the majority of cases reviewed (Gabbert et al., 2021).
The free-recall commenced with a pre-interview explain phase and finished with a closure phase. Participants in the rapport condition experienced an additional rapport phase, with all rapport-building behaviours then continuing throughout the interview. Participants in the no-rapport conditions did not experience the rapport-building phase, and the rapport behaviours were all absent through the entire interview. Interview protocols are outlined in Table 1 (detailed protocols are available from the first author). The questioning phase commenced with a reminder of the four ground rules. Five experienced researchers conducted all the interviews, following the condition appropriate protocols, verbatim (but see Procedure and Fig. 1 also).
Theoretical and evidence-based witness interviewing techniques typically champion rapport-building to reduce some of the social demands of recalling a crime event, thereby potentially increasing cognitive capacity for remembering. Cognitive and social benefits have also emerged in remote interview contexts with reduced anxiety and social pressure contributing to improved eyewitness performance. To date, as far as we are aware no research has investigated the combined impact of interview context and rapport-building behaviours. Here, we investigated episodic memory in mock-eyewitness interviews conducted in virtual environments (VE) and in-person face-to-face (FtF), where rapport-building behaviours were either present or absent.
Finally, participants in the VE + rapport condition outperformed all others. While the standalone benefits of rapport-building and the VE are apparent, our performance and feedback results indicate these benefits were additive in this condition. The VE apparently reducing feelings of anxiety associated with traditional in-person FtF interactions alongside rapport-building behaviours, which feedback indicated had lowered the cognitive task demands. We did not, however, observe a similar pattern of interaction results in the FtF + rapport condition, thereby adding to the literature concerning the potential the benefits of VEs as interviewing spaces (e.g., Mousas et al., 2018; Saarijärvi & Bratt, 2021; Sutherland, 2020) and the impact of environment on complex cognition. The locus of improved performance in the VE + rapport condition was the free recall, where 20% to 35% more correct information was reported than in the rapport-absent face-to-face and rapport-absent VE conditions.
Despite limitations common to most applied research of this nature, our findings advance understanding of the positive impact of basic rapport-building behaviours per se, and as far as we are aware is the first to have highlighted the impact of rapport-building in avatar-to-avatar investigative witness interview contexts. Virtual reality technologies have significant, yet-to-be-fully realised potential to change and improve professional practice in terms of apparently seamlessly supporting prosocial compliance and improving associated cognitions. Increased availability of VR headsets allows people to easily communicate in VEs using accessible platforms. Most participants (+80%) had never used VR headsets but reported them easy to use and were open to being interviewed in VEs. However, availability and accessibility of hardware and software and end-user acceptability requires further attention, although pre COVID-19 government statistics reveal 91% of UK adults already use web-based platforms (Office of National Statistics, 2019). Since the COVID-19 pandemic, digital adoption has taken a quantum leap, changing the way that organisations do business, including police and government bodies (e.g., national crime agency) concerned with security. Accordingly, cognition in VEs must be further investigated, and research is urgently needed to better understand rapport in a diverse range of investigative contexts.
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