About Elizabeth Loftus
Elizabeth F. Loftus (born 1944) is an American psychologist who is best known in relation to the misinformation effect, false memory and criticism of recovered memory therapies. Loftus's research includes the effects of phrasing on the perceptions of automobile crashes, the "lost in the mall" technique and the manipulation of food preferences through the use of false memories. In the Jane Doe case that began in 1997, Loftus and Melvin J. Guyer revealed serious concerns about the background and validity of the initial research. She has also served on the executive council of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry and was a keynote speaker at the British Psychological Society's 2011 annual conference. As well as her scientific work, Loftus has provided expert testimony or consultation for lawyers in over 300 court cases, including for the legal teams of Ghislaine Maxwell, Harvey Weinstein, Ted Bundy, O. J. Simpson, Angelo Buono and Robert Durst. She has also written many books, including The Myth of Repressed Memory: False Memories & Allegations of Sexual Abuse and Witness for the Defense. Loftus's first experiment in this area involved showing 45 students videos of car crashes and then asking the students to estimate the speed of the car. In 2016, Loftus received the John Maddox Prize, In 2018, she won the Western Psychological Association's Lifetime Achievement Award and the University College Dublin's Ulysses Medal. It was also not proven that memories could be wholly invented, rather than altered. Early attempts for Loftus to act as an expert witness for these lawyers were deemed inadmissible by judges, however in June 1975 Loftus presented the first expert witness testimony in Washington State on the topic of eyewitness identification.
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