Doctoral Dissertation Research: Cognitive Depletion and Motivation to Avoid Prejudice during Jury Deliberation: A Self-Regulation Perspective on Interracial Group Decision-Making

增加陪审团的多样性确保了少数民族的声音得到代表，但种族多样性给小组审议带来了独特的挑战。人们发现很难与其他种族的人交往，因为他们担心自己会显得有偏见，或者会受到别人的偏见。在与不同种族的人互动后，人们在记忆和决策任务上的表现往往更差，这是由于调节能力的消耗——人们控制自己的思想、行为和情绪的能力下降。人们越是试图规范自己行为的某些方面（例如，表达偏见），他们就越不能规范其他方面（例如，关注证据）。然而，研究表明，当白人陪审员与少数族裔陪审员（而不是只有白人陪审员）一起审议判决少数族裔被告时，他们实际上记住了更多的案件事实，也更准确。本研究将测试跨种族审议和被告种族（即白人或非裔美国人）对陪审员认知表现和达成公正裁决动机的影响，假设陪审员在判决中避免种族偏见的动机鼓励他们即使在社会互动耗尽时也能很好地履行陪审员的职责。这样的研究增加了对陪审团审议核心的人际关系和认知过程的理解，可以为法院、政策制定者和公众提供信息，更好地解释陪审员的裁决决定，并为法庭实践提供信息。结果可以用来影响有关如何通过减少陪审团室的损耗来最大化多样性利益的政策建议。具体而言，本实验研究依赖于自我调节的社会心理学理论来检验群体审议过程模型，以研究种族多样性对陪审团裁决的影响。自我调节的力量模型指出，人们调节自己的行为、思想和情绪的能力有限；因此，调节努力导致认知消耗和表现下降。从自我调节的角度来看，拟议的研究有望调和两组相互矛盾的发现：(a)人们在与其他种族群体的个体互动后会枯竭（Richeson & Shelton, 2003; Richeson & Trawalter, 2005）；(b)在判决非裔美国人被告时，混合种族陪审团比全白人陪审团的种族偏见更少，更周到（Bowers, Steiner, & Sandys, 2001; Sommers, 2006）。如何解释这种差异呢？本项目检验了几个假设：(a)种族间的讨论比种族同质的讨论更耗费精力；(b)当白人陪审员必须在非裔陪审员在场的情况下对一名非裔美国人被告进行审判时，他们的精力将特别枯竭；但是(c)白人陪审员避免对非裔美国人被告产生偏见的动机（特别是当他们与非裔美国陪审员进行商议时）将克服他们的消耗并确保他们很好地履行陪审团的任务。在模拟陪审团审议范式中，陪审团将包括4名参与者和2名白人或2名非裔美国人同伙，结果是全白人或混合陪审团。陪审员将查看审判证据，被告将以白人或非裔美国人的身份出庭。陪审员将接受有关法律的指导，然后作出个人裁决，深思熟虑以达成共识，并完成监管枯竭（即Stroop测试），记忆，达成公平裁决的动机，避免偏见的隐性和显性动机，以及对其他陪审员的印象。录像审议将被编码，以调查陪审员对证据和有价值贡献的关注，作为陪审团组成和被告种族的功能。

Increased diversity in juries ensures representation of ethnic minority voices, but racial diversity presents unique challenges to group deliberations. People find it difficult to interact with people from other racial groups, because they are concerned with appearing prejudiced or with experiencing prejudice from others. People often perform worse on memory and decision tasks after they interact with people of a different ethnicity, because of regulatory depletion -- a decrease in people's ability to control their thoughts, behaviors, and emotions. The more people try to regulate some aspects of their behavior (e.g., expressions of prejudice), the less able they are to regulate other aspects (e.g., focus on the evidence). Yet studies show that, when White jurors deliberate with minority (versus only White) jurors to judge a minority defendant, they actually remember more case facts and are more accurate. This study will test the effects of interracial deliberations and defendant race (i.e., White or African-American) on jurors' cognitive performance and motivation to reach a fair verdict, guided by the hypothesis that jurors' motivation to avoid racial prejudice in verdicts encourages them to perform their duty as jurors well even when the social interactions are depleting. Such research, which increases understanding of the interpersonal and cognitive processes at the heart of jury deliberations, can inform courts, policy makers, and the public, and better explain jurors' verdict decisions and inform court practices. Results can be used to influence policy recommendations about how to maximize the benefits of diversity by reducing depletion in the jury room.Specifically, the proposed experimental research relies on social psychological theories of self-regulation to test a model of group deliberation processes to investigate the effects of ethnic diversity on jury decisions. The strength model of self regulation states that people have limited abilities to regulate their behavior, thoughts, and emotions; therefore, regulatory efforts result in cognitive depletion and diminished performance. Using a self-regulation perspective, the proposed research promises to reconcile two sets of contradictory findings: (a) people are depleted after interacting with individuals from other racial groups (Richeson & Shelton, 2003; Richeson & Trawalter, 2005); (b) mixed-race juries are less racially biased and more thoughtful than all-White juries when they judge an African-American defendant (Bowers, Steiner, & Sandys, 2001; Sommers, 2006). What explains this discrepancy? The present project tests several hypotheses: (a) interracial deliberations are more depleting than racially homogeneous ones; (b) White jurors will be particularly depleted when they have to judge an African American defendant in the presence of African American jurors; but (c) White jurors' motivation to avoid being prejudiced against an African-American defendant (particularly when they deliberate with African-American jurors) would overcome their depletion and ensure they perform their jury task well. In a mock jury deliberation paradigm, juries will include 4 participants and either 2 White or 2 African American confederates, resulting in all-White or mixed juries. Jurors will view evidence from a trial in which the defendant will be presented as either White or African American. Jurors will be instructed about the law, then render individual verdicts, deliberate to reach consensus, and complete measures of regulatory depletion (i.e., Stroop test), memory, motivation to reach a fair verdict, implicit and explicit motivation to avoid prejudice, and impressions of other jurors. Videotaped deliberations will be coded to investigate jurors' focus on evidence and valuable contributions as a function of jury composition and defendant race.