Improving the Ability of Jurors to Comprehend and Apply Criminal Jury Instructions

The present study used a Self-Efficacy Theory (SET; Bandura, 1977Bandura, , 1986 framework to address the need for an outcome measure in witness preparation training. The construct of Witness Self-Efficacy, broadly defined as a witness's perceived ability to testify in court, was developed drawing largely on existing self-efficacy literature. The goal of the study was to establish initial psychometric properties for the Witness Self-Efficacy Scale (WSES).Participants acting either as mock witnesses or jurors took part in a two-phase study.First, 41 mock witnesses were asked to provide a written account of being falsely accused of an act. They were then briefly deposed about the account, and completed the WSES and construct validity questionnaires. Mock witnesses finally testified under cross-examination from a mock attorney about the accusations. In the second portion, a total of 290 mock jurors (six to eight per group) observed videotaped testimonies of participants from phase one. Mock jurors then provided predictive validity ratings of witness credibility, believability, innocence likelihood, efficacy, and agreement with testimony.Bi-variate correlation analyses showed that the WSES was significantly positively related with general self-efficacy, social self-efficacy, and general self-confidence. The WSES was significantly negatively related to introversion. The scale displayed non-significant relations with social desirability, depression, self-esteem, and innocence expectancy. Multivariate regression analyses showed that the scale failed to predict any of the primary mock juror ratings.Follow-up multivariate regression analyses showed that mock juror ratings of witness confidence iii and the WSES predicted dependent measures, although these independent variables were collinear. Finally, there was an interaction between self and observer ratings of the WSES as it predicted witness credibility.Results are discussed with regard to theoretical and applied implications. Contrary to SET, self-reported WSE appears to be largely correlated with confidence and fails to predict outcomes on its own. Concerning witness preparation, the WSES possesses solid construct validity and reliability, but requires further testing within a witness preparation training model to assess its practical utility. A self-efficacy based method of witness preparation is proposed as a manner of continued research using the WSES.

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“…For example, research on jury instructions (e.g., Severance & Loftus, 1982, Severance & Loftus, 1984 used mock jurors…”

Section: Does Mock Juror and Mock Testimony Research Possess Practicamentioning

confidence: 99%

Witness self‐efficacy: Development and validation of the construct

Cramer

Neal

DeCoster

et al. 2010

Behavioral Sci & The Law

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“…While the legal system operates under the assumption that juries apply the relevant law, some social scientists have reached different conclusions. Studies continue to reveal that jurors experience difficulty understanding instructions and often miss crucial distinctions (Hastie, Penrod, & Pennington, 1983;Kerr et al, 1976;Reifman et al, 1992;Severance & Loftus, 1982). When confronted with confusion concerning the written instructions, some juries send out questions.…”

Section: Requesting Assistancementioning

confidence: 96%

Jurors' intuitive rules for deliberation: A structurational approach to communication injury decision making

Sunwolf

Seibold

1998

Communication Monographs

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Consistent with growing interest in bona fide groups and taking a structurational approach to members' appropriation of rules for decision making, this study was an investigation of potential jurors' intuitive rules for deliberation. Following a summary, critique, and reconceptualization of jury research, we discuss five communicative challenges juries face in the course of their deliberations (selecting a leader, agreeing on voting procedures, determining whether to request assistance from the court, reporting member misconduct, and handling disagreement about whether to continue deliberating) and report results of a content analysis reflecting the rules invoked for each of these situations by 97 citizens summoned for jury duty and waiting for jury service at a courthouse in a judicial district in the western United States.

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“…We did not provide respondents with jury instructions or a definition of reasonable accommodation because prior research demonstrates that jury instructions can be complex and prove difficult for jurors when they are asked to apply the law (e.g., Charrow and Charrow 1979;Severance and Loftus 1982;Ellsworth and Reifman 2000). We sought instead to minimize confusion in order to examine lay perceptions.…”

Section: A Survey Constructionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Deserving Worker: Decisions about Workplace Accommodation by Judges and Laypeople

Weinberg¹,

Nielsen²,

Albrecht³

2019

Law & Policy

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Employment civil rights laws require employers to make reasonable accommodations for certain workers so that they can perform their jobs. The “reasonableness” of an accommodation request should be based largely on the cost of the accommodation relative to the company's resources, but how do people really evaluate such requests? This study examines determinations of the reasonableness of workplace accommodation requests made by trial judges and ordinary people. Using a 2 × 3 × 3 between‐subjects factorial design, we test the effect of worker identity (nursing‐mother worker, transgender worker, and Muslim worker) and cost on determinations of reasonableness. We find that (1) the identity category of the requesting worker impacts determinations of reasonableness by both judges and laypeople, (2) the cost of the accommodation impacts determinations of reasonableness, (3) judges are more likely to think that accommodation requests are reasonable than are laypeople, (4) there is a complicated relationship between accommodation cost and employee identity, and (5) the cost of the requested accommodation mitigates the effect of identity significantly for judges but less so for ordinary citizens. While judges are less influenced by the identity category of the employee‐requestor than are their lay‐counterparts, social status plays a role in determining what constitutes “reasonable accommodation.”

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Improving the Ability of Jurors to Comprehend and Apply Criminal Jury Instructions

Cited by 83 publications

References 10 publications

Witness self‐efficacy: Development and validation of the construct

Witness self‐efficacy: Development and validation of the construct

Jurors' intuitive rules for deliberation: A structurational approach to communication injury decision making

The Deserving Worker: Decisions about Workplace Accommodation by Judges and Laypeople

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