The availability heuristic in person identification: The sometimes misleading consequences of enhanced contextual information

Three field studies investigated the effects of post-exposure cognitions on person identification. Subjects' beliefs that they could identify someone were significantly increased by the presentation of new information and the rehearsal of old information about the person. Misidentification errors increased as the lengths of the initial exposure duration increased and when subjects received additional contextual information about the target. These frequent misidentifications may reflect the misattribution of familiarity from enhanced contextual knowledge to familiarity arising from perceptual knowledge. Further, performance was enhanced when the identification task capitalized on 'transfer-appropriate rehearsal' post-event strategies. Ancillary findings contradicted research on 'verbal overshadowing', and the relationship between identification accuracy and confidence. The results were generalized to real-world situations that encourage post-event cognitions by eyewitnesses.