The weapon focus effect on memory for female versus male perpetrators

Abstract

Previous research suggests that weapons are often inconsistent with the schema activated by eyewitnesses, which leads them to attend to weapons more than they would to neutral objects. Therefore an especially strong weapon focus effect should occur when a perpetrator holds an object primarily associated with the opposite rather than the same gender. As predicted, a handgun reduced the accuracy of witnesses’ descriptions of a female perpetrator more than descriptions of a male perpetrator (Experiment 1). Additionally, memory for a female perpetrator was more severely impaired if she carried a folding knife as opposed to a knitting needle, but the reverse was true when the perpetrator was male (Experiment 2). Finally, the weapon focus effect was eliminated for perpetrators of both genders if witnesses saw them as dangerous individuals (Experiment 3).