Juror Need for Cognition and Sensitivity to Methodological Flaws in Expert Evidence1 (original) (raw)
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Journal of Applied Psychology, 1997
The authors examined whether expert testimony serves an educational or a persuasive function. Participants watched a simulated sexual abuse trial in which the child witness had been prepared for her testimony (i.e., she was calm, composed, and confident) of unprepared (i.e., emotional, confused, and uncertain). The trial contained different levels of expert testimony: none, standard (i.e., a summary of the research), repetitive (i.e., standard testimony plus a 2nd summary of the research), or concrete (i.e., standard testimony plus a hypothetical scenario linking the research to the case facts) testimony. Repetitive testimony bolstered the child's testimony, whereas concrete and standard testimony did not. Concrete testimony sensitized jurors to behavioral correlates of sexual victimization; standard and repetitive testimony desensitized jurors to these correlates. Implications for the use of procedural innovations in sexual abuse trials are discussed.
PLOS ONE, 2017
To investigate dual-process persuasion theories in the context of group decision making, we studied low and high need-for-cognition (NFC) participants within a mock trial study. Participants considered plaintiff and defense expert scientific testimony that varied in argument strength. All participants heard a cross-examination of the experts focusing on peripheral information (e.g., credentials) about the expert, but half were randomly assigned to also hear central information highlighting flaws in the expert's message (e.g., quality of the research presented by the expert). Participants rendered pre-and post-group-deliberation verdicts, which were considered "scientifically accurate" if the verdicts reflected the strong (versus weak) expert message, and "scientifically inaccurate" if they reflected the weak (versus strong) expert message. For individual participants, we replicated studies testing classic persuasion theories: Factors promoting reliance on central information (i.e., central crossexamination, high NFC) improved verdict accuracy because they sensitized individual participants to the quality discrepancy between the experts' messages. Interestingly, however, at the group level, the more that scientifically accurate mock jurors discussed peripheral (versus central) information about the experts, the more likely their group was to reach the scientifically accurate verdict. When participants were arguing for the scientifically accurate verdict consistent with the strong expert message, peripheral comments increased their persuasiveness, which made the group more likely to reach the more scientifically accurate verdict.
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Motivated Cognition and Juror Interpretation of Scientific Evidence: Applying Cultural Cognition to Interpretation of Forensic Testimony, 2016
This paper reports the results of a study investigating how jurors interpret and digest scientific evidence when it is presented to them in a trial setting and how differences in juror attitudes and education influence interpretation of scientific evidence. The study involved a sample of mock jurors recruited from Amazon Mechanical Turk (n=91). Study subjects each viewed a transcript of a mock legal case involving DNA evidence. Results suggest that when presented with conflicting expert testimony, jurors will interpret evidence in a way that is consistent with pre-existing attitudes or beliefs (such as political predispositions). Importantly, results suggest that a juror’s ability to do this and therefore the polarization between jurors of different political pre-dispositions increases as level of education increases. For jurors classified as Conservative, as education levels increased, the prosecution expert was rated as more credible and the defendant was found guilty more often. For jurors classified as Liberal, as education levels increased, the prosecution expert was rated as less credible and the defendant was found guilty less often. Theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed.
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Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 2012
The present research examined whether different types of educative expert testimony can increase mock jurors' knowledge of problems associated with hearsay witnesses and decrease guilty verdicts. Studies 1 (N = 304 college students) and 2 (N = 196 college students) varied the length and types of expert testimony in a trial transcript. While all types of expert testimony did inform mock jurors' knowledge, guilty verdicts decreased when multiple problems with hearsay were presented. The length of the testimony had no effect on verdict. The results suggest that experts who present multiple problems with hearsay testimony are more likely to impact guilty decisions than is no expert or an expert who presents only one problem.j asp_782 535..559 Expert testimony on psychological phenomena is increasingly being sought by the courts. For example, in a recent study of expert testimony since Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (1993), researchers found that approximately one quarter of the experts who had testified from 1988 to 1998 were behavioral scientists (Groscup, Penrod, Studebaker, Huss, & O'Neil, 2002). The range of topics that social scientists have been called to testify about is quite large; ranging, for example, from eyewitness memory to the suggestibility of children to lineup identification and procedures. Evidence from psychological research is clearly being used in the courtroom, but what is less clear is whether such testimony affects jurors' decisions. Though many studies have shown that experts can increase jurors' knowledge (e.g., Kovera, Gresham, Borgida, Gray, & Regan, 1997), the findings have been mixed with regard to the influence on jurors' verdict decisions. Multiple studies have found that having an expert testify in the courtroom can affect jurors' verdicts (
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This study examined the ability of jury-eligible community members (N = 248) to detect internal validity threats in psychological science presented during a trial. Participants read a case summary in which an expert testified about a study that varied in internal validity (valid, missing control group, confound, and experimenter bias) and ecological validity (high, low). Ratings of expert evidence quality and expert credibility were higher for the valid versus missing control group versions only. Internal validity did not influence verdict or ratings of plaintiff credibility and no differences emerged as a function of ecological validity. Expert evidence quality, expert credibility, and plaintiff credibility were positively correlated with verdict. Implications for the scientific reasoning literature and for trials containing psychological science are discussed.
The Effectiveness of Opposing Expert Witnesses for Educating Jurors About Unreliable Expert Evidence
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We tested whether an opposing expert is an effective method of educating jurors about scientific validity by manipulating the methodological quality of defense expert testimony and the type of opposing prosecution expert testimony (none, standard, addresses the other expert's methodology) within the context of a written trial transcript. The presence of opposing expert testimony caused jurors to be skeptical of all expert testimony rather than sensitizing them to flaws in the other expert's testimony. Jurors rendered more guilty verdicts when they heard opposing expert testimony than when opposing expert testimony was absent, regardless of whether the opposing testimony addressed the methodology of the original expert or the validity of the original expert's testimony. Thus, contrary to the assumptions in the Supreme Court's decision in Daubert, opposing expert testimony may not be an effective safeguard against junk science in the courtroom. Keywords Juries Á Experts Á Scientific evidence Courts have been concerned with the possible harm of admitting junk science into the courtroom since their decision in Frye v. United States (1923). In a series of recent rulings (Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals, Inc. 1993; General Electric Co. v. Joiner 1997; Kumho