Decision Making of Juries

(In one study, economists Jeff Biddle and Daniel Hamermesh estimated that for lawyers, such prejudice can translate to a pay cut of as much as 12 percent.) When researchers ask people to evaluate written essays, the same material receives lower ratings for ideas, style and creativity when an accompanying photograph shows a less attractive author. Good-looking professors get better course evaluations from students; teachers in turn rate good-looking students as more intelligent. Not even justice is blind. In studies that simulate legal proceedings, unattractive plaintiffs receive lower damage awards. And in a study released this month, Stephen Ceci and Justin Gunnell, two researchers at Cornell University, gave

In the text Twelve Angry Men by Reginald Rose, the jury began as uncooperative and evolved into a more agreeable jury by the end. The jury started in a state of contradiction and an inability to cooperate. Most jurors only cared to listen to themselves and just wanted to bully other jurors into agreeing with them. They were in a hurry to get out of the deliberation room and just wanted to be done with this case as we can see when Seven said to Ten that “this better be fast” (Rose 88). He just wanted to leave so he could watch a theatrical performance. This proves how little this case meant to him and several other jurors. You can see how they disregard evidence for stereotypes when Ten explained the defendant's supposed lie by saying that the jury “know[s] how [these] people lie… [and] don’t need any real big reason to kill someone either” (Rose 106). He believed that just because the kid was raised in a slum, he would lie and kill ruthlessly. He didn’t believe anyone raised in the slums was above murder and lying. The early jury was a disaster and a disgrace to the justice system, but they slowly began to redeem themselves.

An Analytical Death Just like a detective who analyzes evidence on a crime scene, the twelve jurors in Twelve Angry men by Reginald Rose, are put to the task of analyzing the case of murder, with a young sixteen year-old boy who was accused of killing his father. Some Jurors do not accept this task and stick to their personal prejudice applying it to their decision about the case. While other jurors accept the challenge and analyze the evidence given to them, for example, Juror Eight. Juror Eight analyzes the evidence and keeps his personal prejudice separate from his decision on the case. Juror Eight is analytical.

To begin with, Bias in the court room can be many things: Race, Religion, Sex, etc. For example, In the case: Rodriguez v. Colorado Miguel Angel Peña Rodriguez was charged with sexual assault. According to the article, "Racial bias in the jury room..." the Colorado Supreme Court upheld the conviction of Miguel Angel Peña Rodriguez despite evidence that a juror said, "I think he did it because he's Mexican, and Mexican men take whatever they want." Mr. Rodriguez was accused of making sexual advances toward two teenage girls in the bathroom of a horse-racing track. The juror, H.C., was a former law enforcement officer who also said during deliberations that "where he used to patrol, nine times out of 10 Mexican men were guilty of being aggressive

For the past 45 years in the world of academia only 206 articles were published about jury simulations with the inclusion of jury deliberations (Devine, Clayton, Dunford, Seying & Pryce, 2001). This is a rate of about 4.6 articles per year, a very small number in comparison to all the articles that are published with out jury deliberations. Jury deliberations are an important aspect of juror studies. There has always been ongoing concern amongst researchers about whether jury decision-making can be adequately replicated and studied in the lab. In order to achieve this the focus has often been that if a representable sample is used then the results can be highly generalizable to the public. This paper will attempt to argue that differences between a student sample and community based sample in mock jury studies are minimal and that

I believe there’s the thought of having a correlation between an individual’s physical appearance and his/her achievements, abilities and/or psychological well-being, but I do not think it occurs. However, since this thought is very common, attractiveness interacts with other status characteristics such as education, income, social status, and occupational prestige to create a positive or negative perception of an individual.

In another study, Langlois and Roggaman (1990) took photos of faces and morphed them together to produce composite images made up of 4, 8, 16 or 32 images. Participants rated faces as increasingly attractive the more faces that went into each image; this applied to both male and female faces. The more faces in an image, the more symmetrical they become, it seems that moving a facial image closer to the average increases its perceived attractiveness. It is likely that symmetry equates to fitness and “good genes”, these people are less likely to have been affected by harmful mutation. People with attractive faces are preferred because of the benefits of passing on these attractive characteristics to offspring. Little & Hancock propose that humans have evolved to be attracted to symmetrical faces because they indicate “averageness”, which equates to genetic health. Grammar and Thornhill (1994) found that females are attracted to males with masculine characteristics, for example: large jaw and prominent cheekbones. These features arise as a result of testosterone, which is also a handicap because it suppresses the immune system. Therefore, showing only “healthy” individuals can afford to produce these traits- advertising a strong immune system. Cartwright (2000) supported this, finding men prefer photographs of women with symmetrical faces and vice versa.

However, the formal education of judges allows them to focus wholly and neutrally on the case on which they are weighing. In Cartoon 2 of Document E, the jury declares “We, the jury, find the defendant to be guilty as he looks.” This type of discrimination is less likely to happen in a bench trial because it is the judge’s actual job to be unbiased. However, most of the time jurors are not especially excited to be reaching this verdict, and they also could be harboring unknown discrimination that could easily sway their opinions. Also, the judge is much more focused on the case at hand, contrary to what is seen in Carton 1 of Document E, where only a fraction of the jurors are actually paying attention to the case. A judge has a professional opinion that he or she is prepared to deliver on a case-by-case basis because they are choosing to serve as a judge. Jury duty is a “right” that many people would rather not even have. “…If we’d long had trial by Judge in criminal cases and I were now to suggest that his reasoned and professional judgment as to facts and inferences should be replaced by the blanket verdict of pretty well any twelve men and woman placed in a cramped box and holed up there for days or even weeks at a time you would rightly think that I had taken leave of my senses”

In his infamous “Personal prejudice and financial greed are the two great evils that threaten courts of law, and once they get the upper hand they immediately hamstring society, by destroying all justice.” (Thomas More). As these words from St. Thomas More explain, personal prejudice has long played a part in threatening the judicial system if it overrules personal integrity. Personal prejudice clouds one’s judgment, and therefore makes it difficult to fairly judge the innocence of the defendant. In fact, in the play Twelve Angry Men, Juror Three exhibits the effect that personal prejudice can have on the judicial system, as well as the ineffective arguments produced from this prejudice. He reveals how unsuccessful bias-based arguments are, and the lack of evidence and persuasive reasoning resulting from them. In Twelve Angry Men by Reginald Rose, although Juror three attempts to prove the boy’s guilt with rhetorical appeals to ethos, ultimately his reliance on fallacious arguments and personal prejudice lead to his downfall and eventual breakdown.

Those a part of the American jury system tend to base their decisions on opinions rather than actually analyzing the facts. Those on the jury may not be qualified to acquit someone. In the novel written by Mark Twain he asserts that even though people on the jury take an oath, but they

The Halo Effect is the cognitive bias that generalizes that if an individual has one outstanding favorable character trait, the rest of that individual’s trait will be favorable. Specific to physical attractiveness, this is known as the “Attractiveness Halo.” Attractiveness plays an important role in determining social interactions. In fact, the physical attractiveness of an individual is a vital social cue utilized by others to evaluate other aspects of that individual’s abilities (Kenealy, Frude, & Shaw, 2001). Because of the attractiveness halo, attractive applicants trying to enter the workforce tend to

In the movie 12 Angry Men, the jurors are set in a hot jury room while they are trying to determine the verdict of a young man who is accused of committing a murder. The jurors all explain why they think the accused is guilty or not guilty. Throughout the movie they are debating back and forth and the reader begins to realize that even though the jurors should try to not let bias cloud their judgement, the majority of the jurors are blinded by bias. The viewer can also see that the jurors have their own distinguishable personalities. Their personalities intertwine with each other to demonstrate how the jury system is flawed, but that is what makes it work.

Stereotypical criminal perpetrators are deemed to be unattractive (Saladin, Saper, & Breen, 1988), have long or shaggy dark hair, tattoos, beady eyes, pock marks, and scars.” (MacLin & Herrera, 2006). This study was able to show that having certain features can make other people think differently about you. Many studies have been done to show that a person’s appearance can affect how people perceive them, and this case perceive how likely they are to be a criminal. According to Zebrowitz (1998)

of the latter point is beyond the scope of this article. For an excellent discussion of the topic, see [33]. People do seem to use physical attractiveness as a cue in making extensive inferences about the personality of others. Miller [21], for example, had subjects

Human beings are the most social of social animals and the desire to be liked and accepted is very strong. This desire is forged by interaction with others, which forms interpersonal attraction and judgement of beauty. There are several reasons that could explain why interpersonal attraction occurs in social settings. Repeated exposure to a certain stimulus, allows individuals to develop stronger impressions and greater familiarity towards the stimulus, promoting interpersonal attraction (Zajonc, 1968), while similarity between individuals enhances initial attraction (Vinacke, Shannon, Palazzo & Balsavage, 1988), and allows social validation (Byrne, 1971). Physical attractiveness, one of the most important determinants of interpersonal attraction is often seen as a sign of fertility, strength, or health (Buss, 1999; Thornhill, 1998). Physical attractiveness individuals has been shown to be treated preferentially and more positively to the extent that it influence outcomes of interpersonal interactions (Rhode, 2010), where attractive employees get paid with higher wages (Frieze, Olson & Russell, 1991), and attractive criminals were given lighter sentences (Stewart, 1980). This phenomenon could be explained by the “Halo Effect” (Nisbett, & Wilson, 1977), where evaluations of one attribute of a person are generalized to influence evaluations of other attributes.