Abstract
The recall of an episodic narrative, as a function of presentation modality (audio-visual sketch, audio-only), was examined across three cumulative experiments. Experiment 1: participants (N = 84) were asked to recall a narrative delivered via audio, or audio accompanied by a sketch. Experiment 2: participants (N = 116) were asked to recall a narrative delivered via sketch or audio-only format, both of which varied in duration/number of details to recall. Experiment 3: participants (N = 173) recalled a narrative that varied by modality (audio-only, non-concurrent sketch, hybrid sketch, concurrent sketch) and access/no access to the sketch during recall. Aggregating the data across the three experiments (mini meta-analysis) revealed that participants provided with sketch-based narratives recalled more information and had higher recall accuracy (Md = 0.80 [95% CI = 0.56, 1.04], Z = 6.51, p < 0.001) than those provided with audio-only narratives. The results also revealed that concurrent sketches led to the best recall of a narrative, and having access to the sketch during recall had minimal impact on recall. The potential implications of the results for recalling information in various contexts are discussed.
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Notes
The videos for experiment 1 can be found here:
Audio-only condition: https://youtu.be/gcaEv80tJJ4
Audio-visual sketch condition: https://youtu.be/LZJOWynNZqg
The videos for experiment 2 can be found below. Note that the additional account durations contained forensically relevant information (i.e., was not simply filler details):
5-min audio-visual sketch: http://youtu.be/h5DHVuVy8CU
5-min audio-only: http://youtu.be/ytLHRKFQwbQ
10-min audio-visual sketch: https://youtu.be/nAn_Ao8V1BU
10-min audio-only: https://youtu.be/W-J9QZMNzS8
15-min audio-visual sketch: https://youtu.be/c3OU76QCNjY
15-min audio-only: https://youtu.be/wM1Qq716RHo
The videos for experiment 3 can be found here:
Audio-only: https://youtu.be/YG3sXIIUezg
Non-concurrent sketch: https://youtu.be/GK-YBRgFwKA
Hybrid sketch: https://youtu.be/9AMQZ7Ck55I
Concurrent sketch: https://youtu.be/_L3u6sA6BXo
All experimental data and the inferential statistical analyses with the four extreme outliers included can be obtained from: https://osf.io/ecg7w/?view_only=6d78921d3b0e4ec0a661c0b7621a7160
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Research support was provided by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada to the first author. All authors declare that they do not have a conflict of interest. All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.
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Luther, K., Snook, B., Eastwood, J. et al. Sketching: The Effect of a Dual-Modality Technique on Recall Performance. J Police Crim Psych 38, 469–482 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11896-022-09544-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11896-022-09544-4