Doctoral Dissertation Research: Juror Perceptions of Juveniles Transferred to Criminal Court: The Role of Generic Prejudice and Emotion in Determinations of Guilt.

随着越来越多的青少年作为成年人在刑事法庭受审，研究人员开始研究陪审员是如何看待这些青少年的。几项研究的结果表明，陪审员可能会对作为成年人受审的青少年比对被指控犯有同样罪行的成年人更为严厉；然而，其他研究表明，陪审员对作为成年人受审的青少年没有偏见。本研究旨在通过研究一般偏见和情感在青少年成年审判中的作用来澄清这一问题。一般偏见是指不针对被告或与审判有关的其他当事人的偏见，而是针对一类被告或罪行的偏见。陪审员可能会因为对所有作为成年人受审的青少年的普遍偏见，对作为成年人受审的青少年的判决比对被指控犯有同样罪行的成年人的判决更为严厉。此外，某些情绪的经历可能会促进这种普遍偏见。根据评价倾向框架，悲伤和恐惧会导致更大的系统性认知处理，而愤怒会导致更大的启发式处理，反过来，在做决定时更依赖于刻板印象。本项目的研究1将评估与在少年法庭受审的青少年和在刑事法庭受审的成年人相比，人们对作为成年人受审的青少年有哪些刻板印象。这个项目的研究2将检验愤怒的、恐惧的、悲伤的和中立的模拟陪审员在多大程度上使用这些刻板印象来判断一个青少年作为成年人受审，或者一个成年人被指控犯有同样的罪行。本研究将对确保移交刑事法庭的少年受到公平审判产生影响。刑事法庭的判决可能比少年法庭的判决造成更严厉的惩罚，因此，重要的是要确保作为成年人受审的少年不会比被控同样罪行的成年人受到更严厉的判决。

As increasing numbers of juveniles are tried as adults in criminal court, researchers have begun to examine how jurors perceive these juveniles. Results of several studies suggest that jurors may judge a juvenile tried as an adult more harshly than an adult charged with the same crime; however, other research suggests that jurors show no bias against juveniles tried as adults. The present research aims to clarify this issue by examining the roles of generic prejudice and emotion in jurors' judgments of juveniles tried as adults.Generic prejudice is prejudice that is not specific to the defendant or other parties associated with a trial, but rather prejudice about a category of defendants or crimes. Jurors may judge a juvenile tried as an adult more harshly than they judge an adult charged with the same crime because of generic prejudice toward all juveniles tried as adults. Furthermore, the experience of certain emotions may facilitate this generic prejudice. According to the Appraisal-Tendency Framework, sadness and fear lead to greater systematic cognitive processing, while anger leads to greater heuristic processing, and in turn, greater reliance on stereotypes when making decisions. Study 1 of this project will assess which stereotypes people associate with juveniles tried as adults compared to juveniles tried in juvenile court and adults tried in criminal court. Study 2 of this project will examine to what extent angry, fearful, sad, and neutral mock jurors use these stereotypes to make judgments of guilt when presented with a juvenile tried as an adult, or an adult charged with the same crime.The present research will have implications for ensuring that juveniles transferred to criminal court receive a fair trial. Adjudication in criminal court can result in more severe punishment than adjudication in juvenile court, thus it is important to ensure that juveniles tried as adults are not judged more harshly than are adults charged with the same crimes.