Enhancing Juror and Jury Reasoning

University Of Wyoming, Laramie WY

Investigators

Abstract

As jury trials have become increasingly complex, state and federal court systems have begun to implement innovations to the trial procedure aimed at improving jurors' understanding of evidence. For example, several state courts are now experimenting with allowing jurors to take notes or expanding preliminary instructions. Most research looking at the effects of such changes in courtroom procedure have been done at the level of the individual juror. Although several field studies have begun to assess how these innovations may affect jury functioning, there has been virtually no group-level experimental research in this area. This project tests how jury innovations might affect the process and outcome of jury deliberations. Influential models of juror decision making tend to focus on individual- and not group-level processes. Even models of jury decision making ignore the group process and predict group decisions solely from pre-deliberation verdict preferences. Central to the research is a model of group-level reasoning and an in-depth analysis of group deliberations. Two goals of this study are to discover how changes in courtroom procedure may change the manner in which individual jurors process evidence and also how such changes affect how juries discuss the evidence. Results of this study, therefore, have implications for psychological theories of individual and group decision making, and should also prove valuable to federal and state court system policy makers as they consider implementing these changes.