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Summary:
"The study of memory had become my specialty, my passion. In the next few years I wrote dozens of papers about how memory works and how it fails, but unlike most researchers studying memory, my work kept reaching out into the real world. To what extent, I wondered, could a person's memory be shaped by suggestion? When people witness a serious automobile accident, how accurate is their recollection of the facts? If a witness is questioned by a police officer, will the manner of questioning alter the representation of the memory? Can memories be supplemented with additional, false information?"
The "passion" Loftus describes in the lines above led her to a teaching career at the University of Washington and, perhaps more importantly, into hundreds of courtrooms as an expert witness on the fallibility of eyewitness accounts. As she has explained in numerous trials, and as she convincingly argues in this absorbing book, eyewitness accounts can be and often are so distorted that they no longer resemble the truth.
Customer Reviews:
Average Customer Rating:
Immaterial, irrelevant, and misleading
Customer Rating:
(...) leave book buyers with the false impression that Loftus's book is a universally acknowledged authority. It is not. It is highly controversial and has been vigorously condemned. Memory experts, trauma treatment experts, other lawyers, and readers alike have identified three fundamental flaws that diminish this book's credibility. They are-- 1. Failing to distinguish trauma memory from ordinary memory (different fields, different rules). 2. Applying ordinary-memory principles to trauma memory. 3. Failing to recognize and apply the principles of trauma memory. As a result, the author's analysis is largely immaterial and irrelevant. I share the author's justified horror of convicting any person with tainted evidence. There are recognized means, however, of distinguishing externally imposed false memory from true trauma memory. It would have been useful to have a book on that subject.
There Is No Photo Album In The Brain
Customer Rating:
Many people think that we store our past visual experiences as intact images in the brain. Research, however, shows that this concept is not accurate. The visual recollection of an event has to be recreated by assembling bits and pieces of memory into a whole picture. Our recollection of events is thus often distorted. A variety of psychological experiments have been conducted that demonstrate this phenomenon. Subjects shown a picture of an office later, when asked to recall the photograph, put items such as bookcases or a calendar in the scene that were not actually there. Other aspects of the office are forgotten.
Elizabeth Loftus, an internationally known expert on memory, applies research and her experience to the topic of eye witness testimony in the legal setting. The book attempts to be both entertaining in its often informal presentation of case histories, and modestly academic in presenting psychological theory and research. The case histories for the most part describe trials in which eyewitness testimony resulted in the conviction of an innocent person. Loftus shows how inaccurate recollections combined with inappropriate police photo and lineup presentations can cause a witness to create false recollections. As a side note the book also shows how fallible juries can be. All in all this book provides further proof that eyewitness testimony is not superior to circumstantial evidence.
My only criticism of this book should probably be directed toward the co-author. This book is oriented toward the general public, and the case descriptions are often fluffed to create the "true crime" approach used by writers in that genre. What I found particularly amusing was that, in a book devoted to the topic of fallible memory, Ms Loftus recalls minute trivia that most of us would normally forget within a day. She relates, for example, that in one case she had just finished eating a breakfast of coffee and wheat toast. The coffee had just been put in front of her when the lawyer for the defendant walked into the restaurant. Beyond this attempt at verisimilitude we are presented with a memory of an extremely inconsequential event -the breakfast, and its delivery timing- ten years after the event.
This book is an important read. It demonstrates vividly the inaccuracies of memory, and it presents the subject in a format that would entertain most courtroom novel fans. Author Loftus has written a variety of books including a recent one -The Myth of Repressed Memory"- that debunks repressed memory. A classic of hers is "Eyewitness Testimony" that is oriented more toward psychological theory and research.
For the lay reader
Customer Rating:
This book is easy to read and gives the lay reader many illuminating insights into the work of this well known and respected forensic psychologist. Above all, we catch a glimpse the human side of Elizabeth Loftus, who works not only out of professional commitment to good science and judicial process, but is also moved by her compassion and empathy for persons accused.
An expert's thoughts on Ted Bundy
Customer Rating:
This book is worth reading, if only to study the author's thoughts on Ted Bundy for whom the author testified as an expert witness. On p. 74 the author wonders if Bundy will offer to let her stay in his apartment. On page 83 she describes him as "adorable...all Ivy League charm, clean-cut freshly shaved and showered, bright and eager." And then on page 84 she decides that while everything about Bundy seemed right--his suit, hair and expression--that she decided that Bundy was guilty when he smiled the prosecuting attorney.
Reveals how tricks the mind plays can lead to injustice
Customer Rating:
Long before DNA testing began to demonstrate that an alarming number of people had been convicted of crimes they did not commit, Elizabeth Loftus was using her scientific studies of memory and memory distortion to alert the legal system and the public in general of such injustices. This book describes a series of cases that are classic examples of just how faulty eyewitness memory can be. The book does a great job of mixing documentary story-telling and personal reflection with genuine education regarding what cognitive scientists know about how memory works and doesn't work. This book is engaging and recommended reading for anyone, whether they are an educator, a lawyer, or simply an average citizen who someday may find themselves witnessing a crime or sitting in the jury box deciding someone else's fate.
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