Psychology and courtroom Flashcards
Problems with a mock jury
- participants often students aren’t representative of general population
- reading summary of a case is different to complexities of a real trial
- participants will not feel the emotion involved in real trial as decision won’t affect sentence
Shadow jury
Asking people who are eligible to jury service to sit in public gallery to hear all the evidence, then asking for verdict
greater ecological validity as considering a real case
Research into characteristics of defendant
- attractiveness and jury decision making
- Castellow
halo effect
- belief attractive people have other positive characteristics
- this means that juries are likely to think that attractive people are less guilty
Castellow et al - investigated halo effect on males + females
guilty verdicts when defendant was attractive 56% against unattractive defendant (same for witness)
appearance can have powerful effect on jurors
defendants should dress smartly to try improve appearance
Research into characteristics of defendant
- race and jury decision making
Maeder found white, attractive sexual assault victims were rated more responsible for assault
black defendant + Canadian Aboriginal defendants attractive victims were rated less responsible - race impacts decision
Research into characteristics of defendant
- accent and jury decision making
Seggie found more guilt was attributed to defendant with BBC English accent when crime was embezzlement (white-collar/middle class crime)
Also found more guilt attributed with Australian accent when crime was violence (working lass/blue-collar crime)
Interaction between defendants accent, type of crime they are accused of, and how guilty they are found
Research into the characteristics of the witness
- witness confidence
Penrod and Cutler found participants who heard the witness was 100% confident gave guilty verdicts to robber 67% of time
low ecological validity as mock jury
Research into the characteristics of the witness
- children as witness
Research suggests children are good observers but find it difficult to put observations into verbal account
> more prone to leading questions
Marin et el found they were as accurate as adults in answering objective questions in identifying confederate
No age differences in susceptibility to leading questions
lab experiment - good controls
KEY RESEARCH - DIXON ET AL
- Aim
- Sample
AIM - to test hypothesis that suspect with ‘Brummie’ accent would receive higher rating of guilt than suspect with standard accent
SAMPLE - 119 white undergraduate students (M+F)
- part of course requirement, people who grew up in Birmingham excluded
LAB EXPERIMENT
KEY RESEARCH - DIXON ET AL
- Procedure
Participants listened to a 2-minuite tape recording of a mock interview . Police inspector had standard accent
Person played role of suspect switched between standard accent and brummie accent
In some recordings, suspect was arrested for cheque fraud (white-collar/middle class crime) and some burglary crime (blue-collar/working class crime)
Description of suspect by police inspector was altered black or white - otherwise standardised
Rating of suspect’s guilt was on a 7-point scale from innocent to guilty
Speech evaluation instrument measured language attitudes and how attractive they though suspect as
KEY RESEARCH - DIXON ET AL
- results
- conlcusions
Highest guilt rating was black, brummie-accented, blue-collar suspect
Suspect with brummie accent was rated higher on guilt than standard English - significant difference a p<0.05
Conclusion - non-standard English speakers tend to be perceived as more guilty than standard speakers
KEY RESEARCH - DIXON ET AL
- ethnocentrism
- reliability
- validity
ETHNOCENTRISM
- associated brummie accent with working class culture
- not all cultures have class system like ours , only UK
RELIBAILI
