Personnel Selection in the Pattern Evidence Domain of Forensic Science Proceedings of a Workshop (2017) / Chapter Skim
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2 The Task of Pattern Recognition
2 The Task of Pattern Recognition
Pages 5-20
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From page 5... ...
He pointed out that forensic laboratories have traditionally sought students with a strong science background. In the 1970s, degree programs for forensic science emerged, but there was still a strong preference for science majors, notably in chemistry or biology.
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NATURE OF THE JOB IN FORENSIC LABORATORIES Jessica LeCroy (Defense Forensic Science Center) presented an overview of what pattern evidence examiners do on a daily basis, their job demands, and the skills required.
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? " Siegel added that evidence submitted to forensic laboratories is often not in good condition: for example, fingerprint samples are smudged, or a bullet hit a rock after it struck a victim.
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shared her experiences with hiring and training examiners and talked about recent changes in her department's recruitment and selection process. She reported that the minimal requirements for education or experience are either an associate's degree in any of the specialized areas of photography, crime scene investigation, fingerprinting, and criminalistics or on-the-job experience in an agency working on crime scene investigations, fingerprint comparisons, or as a laboratory technician on automated fingerprint identification systems.2 The position of forensic identification specialist in the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department requires an incumbent to conduct crime scene investigations as well as friction ridge (fingerprint)
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Training Examiners According to Ruggiero, the latent print comparison training program in the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department takes approximately 12 months to complete. The program consists of lectures, demonstrations, required reading of relevant literature and technical manuals, and super BOX 2-1 Recruitment Case: Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department December 29, 2015, to January 13, 2016 Approved to fill 12 open positions More than 450 applications received for the Forensic Identification Specialist position 79 people met minimum requirements and invited to take the written exam 52 people proceeded to the oral interview 38 people successfully passed the oral interview and placed on an eligibility list 13 people placed in the top band of the eligibility list and invited to a selection interview SOURCE: Ruggiero, M.W.
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Pre sentation at the Workshop on Personnel Selection in Forensic Science: Using Measurement to Hire Pattern Evidence Examiners, July 14, National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, Washington, D.C.
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presented what is known about visual search for low-prevalence targets. Training Perceptual Expertise According to Scott, visual perceptual expertise is a critical component of expertise required of a number of professions and activities: for example, a Transportation Security Administration agent screening luggage for potential weapons, a radiologist looking for evidence of breast cancer, a geospatial analyst scanning satellite imagery and assessing damage after a hurricane, a forensic examiner who conducts fingerprint analyses even a -- birding enthusiast searching for rare species.
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Her research examines training factors that might increase perceptual expertise. Her training studies focus on trying to shift people from a basic level of processing, such as basic bird recognition, to the more specific pelican or brown pelican, and examine the best way to accomplish this.
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Presentation at the Workshop on Personnel Selection in Forensic Science: Using Measurement to Hire Pattern Evidence Examiners, July 15, National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, Washington, D.C. Her findings suggest that subordinate-level training was important for increasing perceptual expertise from pre-test to post-test.
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Developing Expertise to See Through Distractions Jurs recognized latent print examination and other types of impression analysis as examples of applied visual attention and perceptual expertise. She noted that fingerprint examiners conduct the task of comparing fingerprints in visually demanding environments.
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According to Merlino, two key concepts for forensic document examiners are that no two people write exactly alike, which is referred to as inter-writer variability, and nobody writes exactly the same way from one time to the next, known as intra-writer variability. When analyzing signatures, Merlino noted that document examiners recognize the range of variation that can exist and evaluate samples on the consistency of written features, such as the slant of the letters, the writing's orientation to a real or imagined baseline, and the letter spacing.
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In addition, the research found that the number of years that the document examiner had been in the field was unrelated to his or her accuracy on those calls. Merlino pointed out that forensic document examiners, on average, spent a greater amount of time on their comparisons and used a greater amount of information than did the lay participants, as indicated by fixations counts, fixation durations, visit counts, and visit durations.
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She posited that experts can form images in their minds in a 1-second view and subsequently work with those images. Merlino and colleagues also gathered information about the training of document examiners by surveying the participating forensic document examiners.
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The personality trait of introversion and the four cognitive factors all added significant predictive power to their regression model. Becker reported that their model was 7 Mark Becker reported using a 20-question survey, a shortened version of a longer per sonality inventory, with decent reliability to assess all five personality traits.
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Additionally, he would like to examine whether individual difference measures could be used to identify the people who would benefit the most from training in visual search tasks.
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