Eyewitness accounts of females and males

In 2 experiments 125 male and 125 female college students looked at a series of slides depicting a wallet snatching (Exp I) or a fight (Exp II) and then took a multiple-choice test of accuracy for the details of that incident. One day later, they read a version of the incident that for some of them contained misleading information about certain objects in the scene. Finally, a test was administered to measure the extent to which the misleading information was incorporated into the S's recollections. Females were more accurate and more resistant to suggestion about female-oriented details, whereas males were more accurate and resistant to suggestion about male-oriented details. This result is related to the general tendency for accuracy on a specific item to lead to an improved ability to resist a suggestion about that specific item. Additional analyses indicated that overall accuracy was related neither to intelligence (as measured by a college entrance test) nor to specific abilities, such as verbal or spatial ability. (19 ref)