NCJ Number
102923
Journal
Medicine, Science and the Law Volume: 26 Issue: 4 Dated: (October 1986) Pages: 283-290
Date Published
1986
Length
8 pages
Annotation
After reviewing the literature on the police sketch artist to determine differing procedures and attitudes toward the creation of a suspect likeness, this paper reports on a comparison of the effectiveness of the British technique for creating an artist's suspect likeness with the effectiveness of 'photofits' and line transcriptions of 'photofits.'
Abstract
The North American method for creating an artist's suspect likeness involves the artist interacting directly with the witness in drawing a face. The traditional British method consists of the artist working indirectly from descriptions provided by police. An experiment compared the effectiveness of the British technique to that of 'photofit' and line descriptions of 'photofits.' The 'photofit' kit contains sets of various facial features representative of the range of human physiognomy. The components are based on photographs of actual facial features. Thirty-six subjects constructed photofit composites of one of six male targets following a 1-minute exposure to a colored photograph of the target. Artist's impressions were obtained by taking the photofits and associated verbal descriptions and giving them to the sketch artist for the creation of a likeness. Line transcriptions were produced by taking the photofit pictures and tracing feature outlines. Judges took the 3 types of composits to try and identify the subjects from among 24 photographs of young men. Good quality photofits proved superior to either artist's impressions or line drawings. Implications are drawn for theory and practice. 1 figure, 1 table, and 19 references.