How Do Non-professional Participants of a Trial Cope with the Communication Process at the Trial? The Results of Empirical Research Conducted in Polish Courts

Abstract

The aim of this article is to present some of the results of empirical research on the communication process at a trial conducted in Polish courts. These results will concern the participation of non-professional participants of a trial and the ways in which they deal with the communication process in the courtroom. The article presents the results of the analysis of the research material conducted in accordance with the detailed research questions and analytical categories. The analysis has especially shown that: (1) the non-professional participants used some legal terminology, but the statements without legal terminology were also communicatively effective; (2) the level of activity of non-professional participants related to participation at the trial varied depending on what the activity concerned; the activity in asking questions to the presiding judges regarding legal issues and the course of the court proceedings appeared to be significant; (3) the non-professional participants’ had a real and significant problem with asking questions during the examination (the proper realization of this element of the trial); (4) the statements of the non-professional participants of a trial were very protective; they used many different “linguistic means of protection” (e.g., acts of supposition or acts of doubt) which are connected with the obligation to tell the truth, the prohibition of concealing the truth and giving false testimony during examination; (5) the non-professional participants of a trial reach for adequate argumentative acts, which are suitable for influencing the perception of specific events or persons, and they strengthen their statements by using appropriate linguistic means of persuasion.

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“…For example, a study on the language of lawyer looks at the case of R versus State Secretary in terms of the word respect used by the primary advocates in the High Court and Supreme Court trials [1]. Different from this study, another one is concerned with the ways in which the non-professional participants of the trial deal with the courtroom communication process [2]. In addition, the other study discusses the function of speech which is used by the judge to the defendants and witness in the courtroom trial process and the realization of presupposition in the trials to obtain the presupposition function [3].…”