Comparing the strength of the confidence-accuracy versus response time-accuracy relationship for eyewitness identification

Abstract

Abstract Research indicates that eyewitness identification (ID) accuracy increases with faster IDs and those supported with immediate high confidence, but it is not clear which measure, confidence or response time, is the better reflector of accuracy. It is also important to know how well these patterns hold up across important factors affecting eyewitness ID accuracy such as memory strength for the perpetrator’s face. We conducted four pre-registered experiments to investigate these issues across different levels of target memory strength (via encoding time or image quality) and ID procedure (showups vs. lineups of different filler quality). Correct IDs were faster than false IDs regardless of memory strength, and this difference was greater for lineups than showups. There was a consistently strong positive CA relationship for those who made an ID, but the RTA relationship was significantly weaker. Both relationships were weaker for those who made a rejection decision, but the CA relationship remained stronger than the RTA relationship. We conclude that immediate confidence may be a more important reflector of accuracy than response time, regardless of the quality of the memory for the perpetrator’s face.