Sl. Sporer et B. Kupper, REALITY MONITORING AND THE JUDGMENT OF TH E TRUTHFULNESS OF ACCOUNTS - AN EXPERIMENTAL-STUDY, Zeitschrift fur Sozialpsychologie, 26(3), 1995, pp. 173-193
How can we discriminate whether or not an account of an event reflects
a factual experience or has simply been invented? To meet this proble
m, in forensic credibility assessment content criteria have been devel
oped which supposedly help to differentiate truthful from deceptive ac
counts. The reality monitoring approach is presented as a theoretical
basis to rest this assumption. According to this theory internally ima
gined and externally experienced accounts differ systematically. Can s
imilar differences be found in accounts of events and can these differ
ences be reliably detected by other judges? If yes, will the differenc
e between experienced and invented accounts be reduced with increased
preparation time? These questions were addressed in a 2x2x2 experiment
al design in which truthfulness (invented vs. self-experienced) and pr
eparation time (immediate vs. one week) were systematically varied. Se
x of subject was used as a third categorical variable. One hundred sub
jects wrote each a true and an invented story in counter-balanced orde
r, with one week time to think about the second account. The 200 stori
es were judged with a modified version of the Memory Characteristics Q
uestionnaire (MCQ) which was adapted for use with external judges. Mul
tivariate analyses of variance and multiple discriminant analyses show
ed that true and invented stories can be reliably discriminated on the
basis of some of these criteria. Contrary to expectation, some of the
se differences were noticeable only after a one week delay. A Brunswik
ian lens model analysis showed a relatively high correspondence betwee
n cue utilisation and cue validity. Results are contrasted with common
sense psychological assumptions and social psychological research on t
he detection of deception and with the results of studies investigatin
g the validity of criteria used in forensic credibility assessment.