... publication, Wells & Olson (2003) provided a comprehensive review of psychological research into eyewitness testimony since the 1970's. In their publication, they provided a user-friendly framework that assists in determining the reliability/unreliability of an eyewitness testimony. The framework includes firstly investigating, the characteristics of the witness, secondly, the characteristics of the event, thirdly, the characteristics of the testimony and fourthly, the ability of testimony evaluators to discriminate between an accurate and inaccurate eyewitness testimony (Wells & Olson, 2003). In this essay, the four elements will be discussed, some in more detail than others, in conjunction with relevant research to provide a critical review of eyewitness reliability in both children and adults. Before discussing the four elements determining eyewitness reliability, it is important to discuss some basic concepts of human memory. In reference to Siegler (1998), it seems many people understand human memory to be simular to that of a ...

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