#11439. Decision importance and Black and Hispanic jurors’ judgments of outgroup and ingroup defendants in a trial simulation

August 2026publication date
Proposal available till 19-05-2025
4 total number of authors per manuscript0 $

The title of the journal is available only for the authors who have already paid for
Journal’s subject area:
Law;
Psychology (all);
Pathology and Forensic Medicine;
Places in the authors’ list:
place 1place 2place 3place 4
FreeFreeFreeFree
2350 $1200 $1050 $900 $
Contract №11439.1 Contract №11439.2 Contract №11439.3 Contract №11439.4
1 place - free (for sale)
2 place - free (for sale)
3 place - free (for sale)
4 place - free (for sale)

More details about the manuscript: Science Citation Index Expanded or/and Social Sciences Citation Index
Abstract:
Because they involve important decisions, should actual trials involve less or more discrimination than trial simulations? In two experiments employing a 2 (decision importance) X 2 (defendant ingroup/outgroup status) design, Black and Hispanic (and some White) college students read a robbery/murder trial transcript. The defendant belonged to participants’ racial/ethnic group or one of the others. Low-decision-importance instructions asked mock-jurors to consider the case carefully. High-decision-importance instructions emphasized the study was a government-sponsored assessment of jurors’ reasoning about a real trial with known guilt/innocence. Black and Hispanic mock-jurors discriminated against defendants of the other group. Greater identity-related processing motivation was reported under high importance. High importance may reduce bias associated with heuristic processing, but promote bias through processing infused with evaluative associations involving social identity and race/ethnicity. The defendant outgroup discrimination regardless of importance suggests prejudice observed in trial simulations may generalize to actual trials.
Keywords:
decision importance; Juror decision-making; prejudice; social identity

Contacts :
0