Ambiguous crimes and inattentional blindness: the science of eyewitness memory

If you saw a crime, how clearly would you remember it? What about if you were questioned years… even decades later?

Eyewitness testimony is an important part of the justice system, so how much do we know about our ability to recall details?

In part three of our four-part series, Forensic, we take a deeper look at eyewitness memory. Because it's not just about what we can or can't recall, there's also the risk that we may not even recognise a crime as it's happening. It turns out we're sometimes less observant than we think, because of a phenomenon called inattentional blindness.

Don't forget to send us your questions based on the Forensic series, you can reach us at [email protected]

Guests:

Celine van GoldeAssociate Professor in Legal PsychologyUniversity of Sydney

Hayley CullenLecturerSchool of Psychological Sciences, Macquarie University

Credits:

• Presenter/producer: Sana Qadar
• Senior producer/reporter: James Bullen
• Producer: Rose Kerr
• Sound engineer: Roi Huberman

You can catch up on more episodes of the All in the Mind podcast with journalist and presenter Sana Qadar, exploring the psychology of topics like stress, memory, communication and relationships on ABC Listen or wherever you get your podcasts.