Strategic race blindness: not so black and white?
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/JCP-09-2012-0006 |
| Date | 20 September 2013 |
| Pages | 127-135 |
| Published date | 20 September 2013 |
| Author | Vincent Egan,Nicola Gilzeane,Maria Viskaduraki |
| Subject Matter | Health & social care,Public policy & environmental management,Sociology |
Strategic race blindness: not so black and
white?
Vincent Egan, Nicola Gilzeane and Maria Viskaduraki
Prof Vincent Egan is a
Associate Professor in
Forensic Psychology Practice
with the Centre for Family and
Forensic Psychology in the
Department of Psychiatry,
University of Nottingham, UK.
Nicola Gilzeane was a student
at the School of Psychology,
University of Leicester,
Leicester, UK.
Dr Maria Viskaduraki is a
Biostatistician, based at
Bioinformatics and
Biostatistics Analysis Hub,
College of Medicine, Biological
Sciences and Psychology,
University of Leicester,
Leicester, UK.
Abstract
Purpose – Strategic race-blindness (purposely avoiding mention of a target’s ethnicity to appear unprejudiced)
potentiallyhinders eyewitness testimony.
Design/methodology/approach – The current study examined whether participant and interviewer race
affected the recollection of black, white or Western Asian individuals, where it was indicated the targets were
criminal or not. Data were gathered using a cognitive interview-type methodology whereby stimulus
questioning was open, rather than prompted. After a short interval participants spontaneously described the
targets and the point at which race was used as a descriptor was noted.
Findings – There was a clear effect of differential race mentioning in free recall by participants. However,
multi-level ordinal logistic regression found neither race of the interviewer nor race of the participant (or their
interaction) influenced the mentioning of the race of the face in the photograph. This remained irrespectiveof
the guilt of the person in the stimulus picture.
Originality /value – Extending the paradigm to persons of Western Asian heritage enabled strategic race
bias to be considered in the context of persons sometimes regarded as being sympathetic to terrorism.
Gathering information using the cognitive interview makes out study closer to the process by which the
police in the UK are trained to gather information.
Keywords Eyewitness testimony, Prejudice, Racial identification, Strategic colour blindness
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
Eyewitness description of an offender’s physical appearance is fundamental to most offenders
being identified and apprehended (Wells et al., 2000; Wells and Olson, 2003). The most
common offender descriptors given to the police comprise race, gender, age and height (Van
Koppen and Lochun, 1997; Walker,2003). However, wrongful convictions are often caused by
errors in eyewitness identification of suspects (Gross, 1987; Gross et al., 2005). Cross-racial
identification can also hinder eyewitness description effectiveness, testimony and identification
(Meissner and Brigham, 2001). The current study examines strategic race-blindness (where the
race of an observed person is noted by a person not of that race, but not mentioned when it is
salient to do so) in the UK. Reflecting the demographics of the UK, we extend racial categories
to include persons from Western Asia.
One confound on cross-racial identification is own-race bias (ORB), where by an eyewitness’s
accuracy improves significantly if the target is of the same race as themselves (Slone et al., 2000).
This effect remains robust across differentresearch methodologies (Chance and Goldstein, 1996).
Quite why people say “they [whoever ‘they’ are] all look the same to me” (Ackerman et al.,2006,
p. 836) is unclear, as there are no consistent differences in facial homogeneity or appearance
between races (Goldstein, 1979). One possibility is that ORB is mediated by the amount of contact
an individual has with those of other races. Feinman and Entwhistle (1976) found individuals living in
more diverse interracial neighbourhoods more adeptatidentifyingpersonsofotherraces
compared to individuals living in less culturally diverse areas. Research from South Africa and
DOI 10.1108/JCP-09-2012-0006 VOL. 3 NO. 2 2013, pp. 127-135, CEmerald Group Publishing Limited, ISSN 2009-3829
j
JOURNAL OF CRIMINAL PSYCHOLOGY
j
PAGE 127
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