Face Recognition in Context: A Case Study of Tips on a Call-In Crime TV Show

Society places increasing demands on the public to help identify terrorists and criminals at large, and to find missing or runaway children (Bailey, 2005; BBC, 2004; Handlin, 2001; Kresnak & Askari, 2002; Martindale, 2003; Merzer, Kuhnhenn, & Strobel, 2003). Since the FBI's first wanted poster in 1910, over 5,400 such identification orders have been regularly disseminated to the public (http://www.fbi.gov). Law enforcement agencies regularly call on citizens to aid in the capturing of criminals and communicate with the public in the form of billboards, news stories, press releases, reenactments on call-in shows, and websites. This concept of tapping into public knowledge has been extended in creative ways to solicit information to find missing children, sex offenders, identify unknown deceased victims, and locate terrorists. Law enforcement agencies go to great effort and expense to create composite images from witness reports (Dawes, 1986, Frowd et al., 2005), or to create a photographable clay model of a face from skeletal remains (Manhein, 2005; Manhein, et al., 2000). The faces of missing children are regularly posted in Wal-Mart entrances, on milk cartons, and via Amber alerts on television and digital billboards on highways. The U.S. Military distributed playing cards with the facial images of wanted Iraqis to soldiers in hopes of increasing the likelihood of capture (Zucco, 2003). Many of these examples rely on the dissemination of facial information to the public in order to see if anyone knows or has seen a particular person. If someone does, they can then respond with information (known as a 'tip') to authorities. Facial images (photos, composites, or video) can be used to try to find someone unknown to authorities (e.g., eyewitness identification), or to find someone known to authorities (e.g., fugitive situation). Each of these situations is a unique face recognition scenario. In eyewitness identification, a witness sees or experiences a crime. The witness encodes details of the crime, and then stores the information in memory for later recall. This information may include a mental image of the perpetrator's face. The information may be used to generate a composite image, or serve as a source of verbal information (a physical description). At some point after the crime, the witness may be shown a mug shot, live lineup, or a photo array and asked to indicate if he or she recognizes anyone and to confirm that the photo presented is the person from the original event (Haber & Haber, 2000; Lindsey, Nosworthy, Martin, & Martynuck, 1994; Wells, 1993). In eyewitness identification, the witness is seeking to match the image in his or her mind with an image(s) presented. In fugitive situations, a person is presented with a photo, composite, video, or information (e.g., vehicle or physical description) via television, internet, posters, or billboards. They are asked to report any information that may be useful in locating the person depicted. In particular, the facial image/information may serve as a cue to memory of a previous event (I remember seeing this person at the store; that's my cousin!) or as an alert to notice this person in the environment (I'm going to keep my eye out for this person). Depending on metacognitive factors (e.g., how strong they feel their memory trace is; their level of confidence in their 'match') and social factors (e.g., their desire to help, fear of repercussions, etc) they may or may not provide their information to police. This type of memory process requires a person to match a photograph or other image to any and all possible matches in memory. We know a great deal about how people recognize faces, and much about factors such as typicality and distinctiveness (Shapiro & Penrod, 1986; Vokey & Read, 1989), race (MacLin & Malpass, 2001; Malpass & Kravitz, 1969; Meissner & Brigham, 2001), multiple views and multiple opportunities to view (Maentylae & Cornoldi, 2002), context (Davies & Milne, 1982; Sanders, 1984; Sporer, 1993; Thompson, Robertson, & Vogt, 1982), and delay (MacLin, MacLin, & Malpass, 2001; Shepherd, 1983). …