Does a weapon attract eyewitness attention?

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  • Ami Sakiko
    Graduate School of Environmental Studies, Nagoya University
  • Kitagami Shinji
    Graduate School of Environmental Studies, Nagoya University

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  • 凶器に対する目撃者の注意の検討
  • キョウキ ニ タイスル モクゲキシャ ノ チュウイ ノ ケントウ

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Abstract

Eyewitness often fails to remember details about the perpetrator of a crime. That is because the witness primarily focuses on the weapon during the encounter. This phenomenon is known as the weapon focus effect. On the basis of the process of the weapon focus effect, there may be a tendency of individuals to attend to a weapon. The present experiment was designed to investigate whether weapons attract more attention than do neutral objects. We assessed participants' visual attention to photographs of weapons and neutral objects presented under identical conditions. We first presented photographs of objects such as knives (i.e., weapons) and cell phones (i.e., neutral objects) in turn. Participants had to click a mouse button as soon as each photograph appeared. We predicted that RTs to the weapon stimuli would be shorter than would those to neutral objects. It was revealed that participants' RTs to weapons were shorter than to other objects. These results are in line with our prediction, and suggesting that individuals have system to pay faster attention to weapons. The present study implies that a weapon influence eyewitness' attention, leading to the weapon focus effect.

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