In Loftus and Palmer’s (1974) research on eyewitness testimony, Experiment 2 was specifically designed to determine whether leading questions distort memory or merely create a response bias. Which of the following statements correctly identifies the critical finding and theoretical conclusion that supported the memory alteration hypothesis?
Participants in the 'smashed' group estimated the speed at 40.5 mph40.5\text{ mph}40.5 mph compared to 34.0 mph34.0\text{ mph}34.0 mph in the 'hit' group, demonstrating that the verb's severity directly dictated the immediate response bias without changing the cognitive structure.
Over 80%80\%80% of participants in the control group falsely recalled seeing broken glass, indicating that the baseline rate of reconstructive errors is high enough to make the verb choice irrelevant.
One week after viewing the film, 161616 out of 505050 participants in the 'smashed' group falsely recalled seeing broken glass compared to 777 out of 505050 in the 'hit' group, supporting the theory that the leading question had integrated with and altered their memory representation.
One week after the event, participants were asked to re-estimate the speeds of the vehicles, and both groups gave estimates that were over 15 mph15\text{ mph}15 mph faster than their original estimates, indicating that memory decays over time.
