Decision Making of Juries
DECISION-MAKING OF JURIES
Characteristics of the Defendant
In an ideal world, a jury would be made up of unbiased and unprejudiced people, intelligent enough to comprehend the evidence and with the necessary verbal and social skills to contribute to discussion. In the real world however, research has shown that jury verdicts are influenced by irrelevant aspects of the defendant such as their physical attractiveness, gender, race and even their accent.
Physical attractiveness:
It does seem to be the case that attractive people are less likely to be considered guilty of crime and that they are often also judged to be more intelligent, confident, happy and truthful than their less attractive counterparts.
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Describe the procedures and findings of the study by Saladin et al. (1988).
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Participants were shown eight photographs of men who were of varying degrees of attractiveness.
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They were given no other information about each man and were then asked how capable each man would be of a) murder and b) armed robbery based on their appearance.
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The photographs were independently rated by a separate group for attractiveness before being shown to the main group of participants. This is important because the researchers can’t rate the photographs themselves.
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FINDINGS:
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If the faces were more attractive then these people were viewed as being less likely to be considered guilty of either crime.
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However, if the participants did say they were guilty then the sentencing was more lenient for those who were
Characteristics of the Defendant
In an ideal world, a jury would be made up of unbiased and unprejudiced people, intelligent enough to comprehend the evidence and with the necessary verbal and social skills to contribute to discussion. In the real world however, research has shown that jury verdicts are influenced by irrelevant aspects of the defendant such as their physical attractiveness, gender, race and even their accent.
Physical attractiveness:
It does seem to be the case that attractive people are less likely to be considered guilty of crime and that they are often also judged to be more intelligent, confident, happy and truthful than their less attractive counterparts.
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Describe the procedures and findings of the study by Saladin et al. (1988).
-------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------
Participants were shown eight photographs of men who were of varying degrees of attractiveness.
-------------------------------------------------
They were given no other information about each man and were then asked how capable each man would be of a) murder and b) armed robbery based on their appearance.
-------------------------------------------------
The photographs were independently rated by a separate group for attractiveness before being shown to the main group of participants. This is important because the researchers can’t rate the photographs themselves.
-------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------
FINDINGS:
-------------------------------------------------
If the faces were more attractive then these people were viewed as being less likely to be considered guilty of either crime.
-------------------------------------------------
However, if the participants did say they were guilty then the sentencing was more lenient for those who were