바로가기메뉴

본문 바로가기 주메뉴 바로가기

Korean Journal of Social and Personality Psychology

ISSN : 1229-0653

Article Contents

Prev Next
e-Submission

Vol.23 No.1

Citation Share

An Effect of Decision Rule on the Stability of Mock Juries' Verdicts

Korean Journal of Social and Personality Psychology / Korean Journal of Social and Personality Psychology, (P)1229-0653;
2009, v.23 no.1, pp.91-110
https://doi.org/10.21193/kjspp.2009.23.1.006


& (2009). An Effect of Decision Rule on the Stability of Mock Juries' Verdicts. Korean Journal of Social and Personality Psychology, 23(1), 91-110, https://doi.org/10.21193/kjspp.2009.23.1.006

Abstract

The present study is to examine whether different decision rules as external norms imposed on the decision group affect the behavior and the final decision of the group differently. Specifically, based on the definition of the stability of jury verdicts as the degree to which different juries render the same verdict for the same case, the stability of mock juries' verdicts under the unanimity rule were compared with that under the simple majority rule. Eighty mock juries of 8 members for each deliberated and rendered verdicts for a murder case in which the defendant pleaded “not guilty” for the reason of self-defense. Half (40) of the juries rendered the verdict under the unanimity rule and the other half rendered the verdict under the simple majority rule. The juries under each of the decision rules were again randomly assigned into four conditions of evidence state：conflicting, exonerating, incriminating, and vague evidence states. The distribution of the verdicts under the unanimity rule yielded lower information entropy than the distribution under the simple majority rule, suggesting that the verdicts under the unanimity rule may be more stable than those under the simple majority rule. Two reasons for the higher stability of the verdicts under the unanimity rule were suggested：The verdicts under the unanimity rule, compared to those under the simple majority rule, correspond more closely to the objective state of the evidence specially in the conflicting and vague evidence condition; jurors deliberating under the unanimity rule are more open to the minority perspectives as predicted by the theory of leniency contract (Crano & Chen, 1998). Implications of the results for the trials by lay participation implemented in Korea were discussed.

keywords
Keywords: Decision rule, Jury, Stability of verdicts, 주요어：결정규칙, 배심단, 평결의 안정성

Reference

1.

박광배, 김상준, 이은로, 서혜선 (2005). 형사배심 평의에서의 사회적 동조와 인지적 전향： 한국 최초의 시민배심 모의재판의 평의에 대한 내용분석. 한국심리학회：사회 및 성격 학회지, 19(3), 1-21.

2.

박광배, 이은로 (2006). 배심평의의 양적 특성을 계량적으로 기술하는 세 가지 지수. 한국심리학회：사회 및 성격 학회지, 20(1), 1-19.

3.

이은로, 박광배 (2006). 배심평결규칙의 법심리학적 제 문제(상)：만장일치규칙과 다수결규칙. 형사정책, 18 (2), 459-500.

4.

Abramson, J. (1994). We, the jury：The jury system and the ideal of democracy. New York：Basic Books.

5.

Asch, S. E. (1951). Effects of group pressure upon the modification and distortion of judgment. In H. Guetzkow(ed.) Groups, leadership and men. Pitts- burgh, PA：Carnegie Press.

6.

Attneave, F. (1959). Applications of information theory to psychology. New York：Holt, Rinehart & Winston.

7.

Baron, R. S., & Kerr, N. L. (2003). Group process, group decision, group action. Buckingham：Open Uni- versity Press.

8.

Bornstein, B. H. (1999). The ecological validity of jury simulations：Is the jury still out? Law and human Behavior, 23(1), 75-91.

9.

Bove Ⅲ, E. J. (2008). Preserving the value of unanimous criminal jury verdicts in anti-deadlock instructions. The Georgetown Law Journal, 97, 251-287.

10.

Call, J. A. (1987). The psychology of jury deliberations. Texas Bar Journal, 50(June), 590-595.

11.

Chesterman, M., Chan, J., & Hampton, S. (2000). Man- aging prejudicial publicity：An empirical study of criminal jury trials in New South Wales, Law and Justice Foundation of NSW, Sydney.

12.

Crano, W. D., & Chen, X. (1998). The leniency contract and persistence of majority and minority influence. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 74, 1437-1450.

13.

Janis, I. L. (1982). Groupthink：Psychological studies of policy decisions and fiascoes. Boston, MA：Houghton Mifflin Company.

14.

Davis, J. H. (1973). Group decision and social inter- action：A theory of social decision schemes. Psy- chological Review, 80, 97-125.

15.

Davis, J. H., Au, W. T., Hulbert, L., & Chen, X. (1997). Effects of group size and procedural influence on consensual judgment of quantity：The example of damage awards and mock civil juries. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 73(4), 703-718.

16.

Davis, J. H., Kerr, N. L., Atkin, R. S., Holt, R., & Meek, D. (1975). The decision processes of 6- and 12-person mock juries assigned unanimous and two-thirds majority rules. Journal of Personality and Social Psychlology, 32, 1-14.

17.

Davis, J. H., Holt, R. W., Spitzer, C. E., & Stasser, G. (1981). The effects of consensus requirements and multiple decisions on mock juror verdict preferences, Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 17, 1-15.

18.

Devine, D. J., Clayton, L. D., Dunford, B. D., Seying, R., & Pryce, J. (2001). Jury decision making-45 rule. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 53, 306-313.

19.

Kerr, N. L. (1981). Social transition schemes：Charting the group's road to agreement. Journal of Per- sonality and Social Psychology, 41, 684-702.

20.

Kerr, N. L., Atkin, R. S., Stasser, G., Meek, D., Holt, R. W., & Davis, J. H. (1976). Guilt beyond a rea- sonable doubt：Effects of concept definition and assigned decision rule on the judgments of mock jurors. Journal of Personality and Social Psy- chology, 34, 282-294.

21.

Kerr, N. L., & MacCoun, R. J. (1985). The effects of jury size and polling method on the process and product of jury deliberation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 48, 349-363.

22.

Kerr, N. L., MacCoun, R. J., & Kramer, G. P. (1996). Bias in judgment：Comparing individuals and groups. Psychological Review, 3(4), 687-719.

23.

Leib, E. J. (2006). Supermajoritarianism and the American criminal jury, Hastings Const. Law Quarterly, 141, 170.

24.

Lloyd-Bostock, S., & Thomas, C. (2000). The continuing decline of the English jury. In World Jury System. New York：Oxford University Press.

25.

MacCoun, R. J. (1989, June). Experimental research on jury decision-making. Science, 244, 1046-1050.

26.

MacCoun, R. J., & Kerr, N. L. (1988). Asymmetric influence in mock jury deliberation：Jurors' bias for leniency. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 54, 21-33.

27.

MacCoun, R. J., & Tyler, T. R. (1988). The basis of citizens' perceptions of the criminal jury：Proce- dural fairness, accuracy, and efficiency. 12 Law & Human Behavior, 333, 337-340.

28.

Milgram, S. (1963). Behavioral study of obedience. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 67, 371- 378.

29.

Milgram, S. (1974). Obedience to Authority：An Experi- mental View. New York：Harper and Row.spectives on groupthink：A twenty-fifth anniversary appraisal. Guest editorial. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 73, 103-104.

30.

Vidmar, N. (2000). A Historical and comparative perspective on the common law jury. In World Jury System. New York：Oxford University Press.

31.

Zimbardo, P. G. (1972). Pathology of imprisonment. Society, 9, 4-8.

Korean Journal of Social and Personality Psychology

e-Submission OA Policy