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Individual and Group Decisions in Response to a Mock Trial: A Methodological Note 1
Author(s) -
McGuire Mary V.,
Bermant Gordon
Publication year - 1977
Publication title -
journal of applied social psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.822
H-Index - 111
eISSN - 1559-1816
pISSN - 0021-9029
DOI - 10.1111/j.1559-1816.1977.tb00747.x
Subject(s) - psychology , jury , race (biology) , defense attorney , social psychology , presentation (obstetrics) , group (periodic table) , law , medicine , political science , sociology , gender studies , chemistry , organic chemistry , radiology
An audiovisual slide‐show presentation of a murder trial was used to examine the effects of group deliberations on juror's responses. Sex of defense attorney and race of defendant were systematically varied in the mock trial. Verdicts were assessed immediately following the trial presentation (before group deliberations) and immediately following group deliberations. Neither sex nor race significantly affected distributions of individual juror's predeliberation verdicts. Following group deliberations, however, an effect of attorney's sex emerged in both jury (group) verdicts and in individual, postdeliberation verdicts. Jurors in the male defense attorney conditions were more likely to vote not guilty following deliberations than were jurors in the female defense attorney conditions. This effect is discussed in terms of group shift.