Self-study
At mock trials in which jury instructions were given in technical legal jargon, jury verdicts tended to mirror the judge's own opinions. ██████ ███ ██████ █████ ██ ███ ███████ █████████ █████████ ██████ ████████████ ████ ██████████ ████ ██ ██████ ██████ ███ ██████ ███ ████ ████ ███ ████ █████ ███████████ ██ ██████ ████████████ █████████ ████████ ████ █████████████ ████ ██████ ██ ██████ ████████ ██ ████ ████ ███ ███████ ████████
Summary
When jury instructions were given in technical jargon, jury verdicts tended to match the judge’s own opinions. Juries observed the judge’s nonverbal behavior. When jury instructions were given in clear, nontechnical language, verdicts were more likely to conflict with the judge’s opinion.
Strongly Supported Conclusions
When juries are instructed in ways that involve technical jargon, they are likely to be influenced by their perception of the judge’s opinions about the case.
If we want to minimize the chance that a jury will be influenced by their perception of the judge’s opinion of the case, we should have jury instructions delivered in nontechnical language.
4.
Which one of the following ██ ████ ███████████ ██ ███ ███████ █████████ ██████
a
Technical language tends ██ ██ ████ ███████ ████ ████████████ █████████
Unsupported. Nothing in the stimulus supports judgments about the level of precision of technical language or nontechnical language.
b
A person's influence ██ ████████████ ██ ████ ████████ █████████ ███████
Unsupported. The stimulus doesn’t contain any examples of people with different level of perceived status. And the judges’ influence on jury verdicts wasn’t connected to the judges’ perceived status.
c
Nonverbal behavior is ███ ██ █████████ █████ ██ ██████████████
Unsupported. We don’t know whether judges were trying to communicate anything through nonverbal behavior or whether they were successful. It’s possible such behavior was very effective in conveying the judges’ opinions to juries.
d
Real trials are ██████ ██████ ███ ███████████████ ████ ███ ████ ███████
Unsupported. The stimulus involved a mock trial. We don’t have any comparison to a real trial or whether a real trial would have been more effective for experimentation.
e
The way in █████ █ █████ █████████ █ ████ ███ █████████ ███ ██████ ████████
Strongly supported. Instructions in technical jargon produced verdicts that were more likely to mirror the judge’s opinions. One plausible causal mechanism that accounts for this is that the juries focused more on the judges’ nonverbal behavior.