Personally intrusive questioning during cross‐examination has become commonplace. The differential impact of this questioning on female vs. male experts was the focus in this study, thus these questions are referred to as gender‐intrusive questions. The results demonstrated that the female expert was rated as less confident, trustworthy, likable, believable, and credible than the male expert. The male and female experts were both rated as more credible, trustworthy, and believable when subjected to gender‐intrusive questions. Furthermore, the use of these questions left the jurors with a negative impression of the prosecuting attorney and his case. Jury members were more likely to believe that the evidence exhibited the most support for the defense's case when the witness was subjected to gender‐intrusive questioning.
This investigation of expert witness gender used scenarios addressing threats to the expert, sexuality, parenting by the expert, and lying, and in which intrusive and non-intrusive gender cross-examinations were presented to 352 mock jurors. Male and female experts were matched carefully on attractiveness and other social desirability dimensions. In half of the situations the expert witnesses replied with defensive answers, and in the other half, they replied assertively. The assertive responses were found to be significantly more effective on a number of dependent measures, including perceived credibility. In results consistent with other studies, the male experts were evaluated more positively than the female experts. Sexism and other attitudes of the mock jurors were unrelated to credibility and expert gender. The results are discussed in the context of managing aggressive cross-examinations, role demands for women in the courtroom, and methodological approaches to the study of expert witness gender.
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