Criminal Psychology Flashcards
point 1 indiv/situ PSYCH + the COURTROOM
Point : is individual when personal characteristics influence decisions
Example : Castellow’s study into the attractiveness of a defendant and plaintiff showed that the verdict of guilty in a sexual harrassment allegation can change from 83% when the plaintiff is attractive and the defendant is not, or down to 41% when vice versa.
Link : Suggests that jury would infer the defendants guilt based on who was most attractive. Lowers validity of verdict as individual characterisitcs affect likelihood of a specific verdict
Counterargument : However, it furthers our understanding of how jury’s work, so lawyers can convinve jury of innocence/guilt by dressing their client in a specific way.
point 2 indiv/situ PSYCH + the COURTROOM
Point : Is situational when external factors influence jury’s decision
Example : Broeder’s study showed that evidence being ruled as inadmissible raised money awarded to women hit by careless driver from $37k to $46k.
Link : Shows that an external factor (inadmissible evidence) influenced the decision of the jury
Counterargument : However, it’s likely that individual factors will also impact decision making unless everyone behaves the same way in response to a situational factor.
point 3 indiv/situ PSYCH + the COURTROOM
Point : Is individual when the jury is biased against the defendant based on their individual traits.
Example : Dixon’s research into the role of accents and context in the admission of guilt showed that a higher % of guilt given to ppl with a Brummie accent. + jury show a higher verdict against those ppl who has a blue collar crime.
Link: Shows that mixes of ethincity and accents as well as different crimes will cause people to give different verdicts.
Counter-argument : However, it may be harder for a jury to decide upon the guilt of the defendent without seeing them, as appearances may give a specific view on the peroson.
point 1 usefulness PSYCH + the COURTROOM
Point : Less useful as it does not involve a real jury
Example : Dixon’s study into accents in perception of guilt there were 119 students who made up the mock jury.
Link : Suggests that the results could be less accurate as the use of a mock jury lacks ecological validity because they know it’s not a real trial and the decision doesn’t lie in their hands.
Counter-argument : However, it is always worth carrying out research if there is a chance that there might be some element of benefit to society.
point 2 usefulness PSYCH + the COURTROOM
Point : Useful if it furthers our understanding
Example : Pennington and Hasties study shows that explaining the story chronologically to a jury is more persuasive as opposed to the witness order which was originally believed to be more persuasive.
Link : Bcos story order makes it easier for jurors to construct a story out of events told in correct order than events told in wrong order to increase impact.
Counterargument : However, if the participants used are a mock jury it has reduced accuracy than a real jury which makes it difficult to say whether this would apply to a real jury.
point 3 usefulness PSYCH + the COURTROOM
Point : is useful when it has real life applications that could benefit society
Example : Dixon’s study into accents in perception of guilt found that if a suspect had a brummie accent they were rated more highly on a 7 point scale from innocent to guilty.
Link : suggests that juries should be made aware of research + told not to be biased by someone’s accent when deciding if they are guilty or not, this might reduce the number of biased guilty verdicts.
Counterargument : However, it can be difficult to assess if practical application has made a difference to society and it may not be realistic to put changes into place especially if they involve young people changing deep seated beliefs, but this does not mean that we should not try to implement positive change.
