The Cross-Race Effect
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Authors
Knue, Kathryn
Issue Date
2009
Type
Thesis
Language
en_US
Keywords
Alternative Title
Abstract
The Cross-Race Effect (CRE) is the phenomenon that people are better at recognizing own-race
members more accurately than other-race members. Unfortunately, when individuals incorrectly
identify members of other races, they often do so with high levels of confidence. This
occurrence is particularly problematic in criminal cases because eye-witness misidentification is
one of the leading causes of wrongful convictions, especially when the defendant is a member of
a different race than the eye-witness. There is currently no agreement in the literature regarding
the cause of the CRE. Many psychologists suggest that a lack of interracial contact or interaction
is the cause of the CRE while other psychologists indicate that the CRE occurs at the stage of
encoding and is the result of own-race perceptual expertise. Some psychologists also suggest
that cognitive disregard and social-categorization models are responsible for the CRE as people
frequently recognize others as in-group members (e.g. own-race members) or out-group
members (e.g. other-race members). Especially in cases of identification, it is important to
understand the causes of the CRE to avoid wrongful incarceration and further. research should be
done in the field to further understand the CRE.
Description
v, 26 p.
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