Plan:
I plan on including on including issues with relative judgment versus absolute judgment when it comes to lineups. I will also state which lineup procedure produces which judgment and what has shown to produce fewer false positives. The last thing I will do is explain the importance of why suspects should look similar in different ways and why this is important when it comes to conducting a fair lineup procedure.
“Researchers like Gary Wells, Ph.D., from Iowa State University, claim, however, that during simultaneous lineups, witnesses use “relative judgment,” meaning that they compare lineup photographs or members to each other, rather than to their memory of the offender” (Schuster, 2007). An absolute judgment is a judgment that requires the person to be 100 percent certain in their choice where a relative judgment is when someone makes up their mind based on what looks the closest. In this case it would be a suspect.
According to Schuster (2007), the suspect, if he is in the in person lineup or in a picture lineup, should not stand out from the others in the lineup. People’s eyes are drawn to what is different. If you make sure that all the men or women in the pictures have a similar appearance, have the same background in their picture, race, age, and are wearing the same or similar clothing, just to name a few, then the risk of getting a false positive will decrease.