PrepTest 150, Section 1, Question 8
When interviewing witnesses to a crime, police interviewers(453 more words not shown)
The author refers to "alibis"(9 more words not shown)
- Ahighlight a positive(5 more words not shown)
- Bexemplify the kind(9 more words not shown)
- Cpoint to a(10 more words not shown)
- Dcontrast the concerns(7 more words not shown)
- Eillustrate the complexity(4 more words not shown)
Reading the passage
What would checking an alibi accomplish? Suppose someone is suspected of committing a crime, but a witness places that person at a gym across town at the time. Confirming that account could help rule the suspect out. A conflicting account could undermine the alibi instead.
What we’re looking for
That gives us the job of the opening reference: it's one practical use for information obtained from a cooperating eyewitness. The sentence explains why police want effective interviews before the writer compares ways of conducting them.
Working the answers
- A
Psychological research enters with the cognitive interview in the next part of the discussion. The reference to alibis first establishes what police need information for; it doesn't yet show what that research contributed.
- B
Watch who is being interviewed. The opening describes information from a “cooperating eyewitness,” not information elicited from a suspect. A witness can confirm or challenge a suspect's alibi without being the suspect. The topic sounds familiar, but this changes the person's role.
- CCorrect
Confirming or disconfirming alibis illustrates what police can do with information from an effective interview. It supplies a reason to care about the interviewing methods that follow.
- D
No disagreement between police and psychologists appears here. We aren't contrasting what the two groups care about.
- E
The complexity of the cognitive interview comes later. Checking an alibi is a possible use of the information, not an illustration of the complicated procedures used to obtain it.
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