CoChat
Sign Up
Cited by 22Legal processes and jurisprudenceDeception detection and forensic psychologyForensic Fingerprint Detection Methods

The DOI matches its Crossref record; 3 of the 3 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.

Do evidence submission forms expose latent print examiners to task-irrelevant information?

Open access
Gardner, Brett O., Kelley, Sharon, Murrie, Daniel C., Blaisdell, Kellyn N.·2019·Forensic Science International
DOI 10.1016/j.forsciint.2019.01.048
Open this paper in CoChat — free account

Abstract

Emerging research documents the ways in which task-irrelevant contextual information may influence the opinions and decisions that forensic analysts reach regarding evidence (e.g., Dror and Cole, 2010; National Academy of Sciences, 2009; President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, 2016). Consequently, authorities have called for forensic analysts to rely solely on task-relevant information-and to actively avoid task-irrelevant information-when conducting analyses (National Commission on Forensic Science, 2015). In this study, we examined 97 evidence submission forms, used by 148 accredited crime laboratories across the United States, to determine what types of information laboratories solicit when performing latent print analyses. Results indicate that many laboratories request information with no direct relevance to the specific task of latent print comparison. More concerning, approximately one in six forms (16.5%) request information that appears to have a high potential for bias without any discernible relevance to latent print comparison. Solicitations for task-irrelevant information may carry meaningful consequences and current findings inform strategies to reduce the potential for cognitive bias.

Overview

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1016/j.forsciint.2019.01.048

Cites

3 of 3 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Recomputing p-values needs the paper’s full text.

Verification

Claims the paper makes

We couldn’t retrieve this paper’s full text, so its claims and self-check weren’t run. The registry and citation checks still apply.

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

  • Fingerprint experts are exposed over 40% of the time to information about the suspect's criminal history.

    “For example, fingerprint experts whose job is to compare two fingerprints (one from the crime scene and one from the suspect) and to decide if they are ‘similar enough’ to conclude that they originate from the same source are exposed over 40% of the time to information about the suspect’s criminal history (Gardner et al., 2019).”

    From Biased and biasing: the hidden bias cascade and bias snowball effects (2025) · cites this paper as Gardner et al., 2019

  • Fingerprint examiners knowing whether the suspect has a criminal record is an example of irrelevant contextual information; this information appears in over 40% of formal requests for forensic examination.

    “Level 3 (in Figure 1) is about irrelevant contextual information, such as a fingerprint examiner knowing whether the suspect has a criminal record (this information appears in over 40% of the formal request for forensic examination, Gardner et al., 2019).”

    From Biased and biasing: the hidden bias cascade and bias snowball effects (2025) · cites this paper as Gardner et al., 2019

Citations

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Research works printed but not linked: 19

  1. Dror, 2010, The vision in “blind” justice: expert perception, judgment, and visual cognition in forensic pattern recognition, Psychon. Bull. Rev., 17, 161, 10.3758/PBR.17.2.161 · DOI
  2. Kassin, 2013, The forensic confirmation bias: problems, perspectives, and proposed solutions, J. Appl. Res. Mem. Cogn., 2, 42, 10.1016/j.jarmac.2013.01.001 · DOI · Paper page
  3. Nickerson, 1998, Confirmation bias: a ubiquitous phenomenon in many guises, Rev. Gen. Psychol., 2, 175, 10.1037/1089-2680.2.2.175 · DOI · Paper page
  4. Furnham, 2011, A literature review of the anchoring effect, J. Socio. Econ., 40, 35, 10.1016/j.socec.2010.10.008 · DOI · Paper page
  5. Edmond, 2015, Contextual bias and cross-contamination in the forensic sciences: the corrosive implications for investigations, plea bargains, trials and appeals, Law Probab. Risk, 14, 1, 10.1093/lpr/mgu018 · DOI
  6. Stevenage, 2017, A biased opinion: demonstration of cognitive bias on a fingerprint matching task through knowledge of DNA test results, Forensic Sci. Int., 276, 93, 10.1016/j.forsciint.2017.04.009 · DOI
  7. Kukucka, 2014, Do confessions taint perceptions of handwriting evidence? An empirical test of the forensic confirmation bias, Law Hum. Behav., 38, 256, 10.1037/lhb0000066 · DOI
  8. Osborne, 2014, Does contextual information bias bitemark comparisons?, Sci. Justice, 54, 267, 10.1016/j.scijus.2013.12.005 · DOI
  9. Dror, 2015, Letter to the editor — context management toolbox: a linear sequential unmasking (LSU) approach for minimizing cognitive bias in forensic decision making, J. Forensic Sci., 60, 1111, 10.1111/1556-4029.12805 · DOI · Paper page
  10. Dror, 2006, Contextual information renders experts vulnerable to making erroneous identifications, Forensic Sci. Int., 156, 74, 10.1016/j.forsciint.2005.10.017 · DOI · Paper page
  11. Johnson, 1995, Justice is still not colorblind: differential racial effects of exposure to inadmissible evidence, Pers. Soc. Psychol. Bull., 21, 893, 10.1177/0146167295219003 · DOI
  12. DeSantis, 1997, Defendants’ characteristics of attractiveness, race, and sex and sentencing decisions, Psychol. Rep., 81, 679, 10.2466/pr0.1997.81.2.679 · DOI
  13. Rachlinski, 2009, Does unconscious racial bias affect trial judges?, Notre Dame Law Rev., 84, 1195
  14. Drwecki, 2011, Reducing racial disparities in pain treatment: the role of empathy and perspective-taking, Pain, 152, 1001, 10.1016/j.pain.2010.12.005 · DOI
  15. Thompson, 2011, What role should investigative facts play in the evaluation of scientific evidence?, Aust. J. Forensic Sci., 43, 123, 10.1080/00450618.2010.541499 · DOI
  16. Dror, 2011, Cognitive issues in fingerprint analysis: inter- and intra-expert consistency and the effect of a ‘target’ comparison, Forensic Sci. Int., 208, 10, 10.1016/j.forsciint.2010.10.013 · DOI
  17. Dror, 2006, Why experts make errors, J. Forensic Identif., 56, 600
  18. Dror, 2012, The impact of human-technology cooperation and distributed cognition in forensic science: biasing effects of AFIS contextual information on human experts, J. Forensic Sci., 57, 343, 10.1111/j.1556-4029.2011.02013.x · DOI
  19. Saks, 2003, Context effects in forensic science: a review and application of the science of science to crime laboratory practice in the United States, Sci. Justice, 42, 77, 10.1016/S1355-0306(03)71747-X · DOI

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Metadata

Authors
Gardner, B. O., Kelley, S., Murrie, D. C., & Blaisdell, K. N.
Affiliations
University of Virginia (US)
Corresponding author
Gardner, Brett O.
ORCID
Venue
Forensic Science International
Publisher
Elsevier BV
Published
2019-04
Volume
297
Pages
236-242
ISSN
0379-0738 (ISSN-L)
DOI
10.1016/j.forsciint.2019.01.048
OpenAlex
W2911546929
Cited by
22
References
3
Citations by year
2025: 3 · 2024: 5 · 2023: 2 · 2022: 4 · 2021: 3 · 2020: 4 · 2019: 1
FWCI
26.18
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • Forensic Science International (acceptedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Iowa State University Digital Repository (Iowa State University) (submittedVersion)
Funders
  • University of Virginia
  • University of California, Irvine
  • National Institute of Standards and Technology
  • Carnegie Mellon University
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Law › Legal processes and jurisprudence
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Deception detection and forensic psychology
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Pathology and Forensic Medicine › Forensic Fingerprint Detection Methods
Keywords
task-irrelevant information, cognitive biases, crime laboratories, forensic evidence evaluation, bias mitigation
MeSH terms
Forms as Topic, Dermatoglyphics, Humans, Laboratories, Bias, Forensic Sciences

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review