And the connection may run: Clark et al., “Free to Punish,” 508.
Wanting to punish the judge: Interestingly, not only do people report stronger beliefs in free will after considering immoral behavior than after assessing neutral behavior, but real world data also shows that countries with higher crime and murder rates also have higher beliefs in free will. Clark et al., “Free to Punish,” 501, 508.
When it comes to our moral intuitions: Experiments show that judgments of causation, for example, are contingent both on whether the consequences of an action are harmful or helpful (with harmful consequences giving rise to a greater sense of causality) and whether the purpose of the action giving rise to a harm was good or bad. Clark et al., “Free to Punish,” 502. In one study, people viewed a driver as possessing more causal control in an accident when he crashed racing home to hide drugs from his parents than when he was racing home to hide an anniversary present he had bought them. Mark D. Alicke, “Culpable Causation,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 63, no. 3 (1992): 368–78.
That is remarkable, given that: Alexander Volokh, “n Guilty Men,” University of Pennsylvania Law Review 146 (1997): 174. Remember, even back in the early Middle Ages, before mental state and capacity requirements were introduced, there still needed to be proof that the defendant in question caused a harm. Dressler, Understanding Criminal Law, 85, 117.
As Benjamin Franklin explained: Benjamin Franklin, The Writings of Benjamin Franklin, vol. 9, ed. Albert Henry Smyth (London: Macmillan, 1906): 295; Volokh, “n Guilty Men,” 174.
The famous English jurist: Volokh, “n Guilty Men,” 174.
Even the Bible says that: Volokh, “n Guilty Men,” 173, 177.
In one set of experiments: Benforado and Goodwin, Unpublished Experiment.
In the first scenario: Benforado and Goodwin, Unpublished Experiment.
In the third scenario: Benforado and Goodwin, Unpublished Experiment.
Not surprisingly, participants showed: Benforado and Goodwin, Unpublished Experiment.
But they didn’t see: Benforado and Goodwin, Unpublished Experiment.
The shark from the same species: Benforado and Goodwin, Unpublished Experiment.
In related work, researchers looked: Fiery Cushman, A. J. Durwin, and Chaz Lively, “Revenge without Responsibility? Judgments about Collective Punishment in Baseball,” Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 48 (2012).
What they found was that nearly: Cushman, Durwin, and Lively, “Revenge without Responsibility?” 1108
When it was their team: Cushman, Durwin, and Lively, “Revenge without Responsibility?” 1109.
The implications of the research: Benforado and Goodwin, Unpublished Experiment.
The bloody unfairness stains: Carlsmith and Sood, “The Fine Line,” 192.
Change the color of the woman’s skin: Jennifer L. Eberhardt et al., “Looking Deathworthy: Perceived Stereotyping of Black Defendants Predicts Capital-Sentencing Outcomes,” Psychological Science 17, no. 5 (2006): 383.
Numerous studies have shown: Eberhardt et al., “Looking Deathworthy,” 383.
African Americans who end up: John Donahue, III, “Capital Punishment in Connecticut, 1973–2007: A Comprehensive Evaluation from 4686 Murders to One Execution” (working paper, Stanford Law School, National Bureau of Economic Research, June 8, 2013): 8, http://works.bepress.com/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1095&context=john_donohue.
If we keep everything else: Eberhardt et al., “Looking Deathworthy,” 383.
Black defendants are considerably: One influential study showed that black prisoners make up 41 percent of the death row population. David Baldus et al., “Racial Discrimination and the Death Penalty in the Post-Furman Era: An Empirical and Legal Overview, with Recent Findings from Philadelphia,” Cornell Law Review 83 (1998): 1652.
They also receive higher bails: Ian Ayres and Joel Waldfogel, “A Market Test for Race Discrimination in Bail Setting,” Stanford Law Review 46 (1994): 992; David B. Mustard, “Racial, Ethnic, and Gender Disparities in Sentencing: Evidence from the U.S. Federal Courts,” Journal of Law and Economics 44 (2001): 300; Adam Benforado, “Quick on the Draw: Implicit Bias and the Second Amendment,” Oregon Law Review 89 (2010): 28; Aneeta Rattan et al., “Race and the Fragility of the Legal Distinction between Juveniles and Adults,” PLOS ONE 7, no. 5 (2012): 1.
Black juveniles are not only: Rattan et al., “Race and the Fragility,” 1; Margaret C. Stevenson and Bette L. Bottoms, “Race Shapes Perceptions of Juvenile Offenders in Criminal Court,” Journal of Applied Social Psychology 29 (2009): 1661.
This evidence of racial bias: Tara L. Mitchell et al., “Racial Bias in Mock Juror Decision-Making: A Meta-Analytic Review of Defendant Treatment,” Law and Human Behavior 29, no. 6 (2005): 629; Sandra Graham and Brian S. Lowery, “Priming Unconscious Racial Stereotypes About Adolescent Offenders,” Law and Human Behavior 28, no. 5 (2004): 483.
Juvenile probation officers, for instance: Graham and Lowery, “Priming Unconscious Racial Stereotypes,” 489–90, 496.
It appears to be largely: That said, both implicit and explicit racism may have an effect. Rattan et al., “Race and the Fragility,” 2.
Scientists think that the ultimate: Graham and Lowery, “Priming Unconscious Racial Stereotypes,” 485, 487.
These stereotypes provide a ready: Graham and Lowery, “Priming Unconscious Racial Stereotypes,” 485.
And when the focus is on: Graham and Lowery, “Priming Unconscious Racial Stereotypes,” 487, 499.
In one recent experiment, researchers had: Rattan et al., “Race and the Fragility,” 2.
Participants were then asked: Rattan et al., “Race and the Fragility,” 2.
The texts given to the groups: Rattan et al., “Race and the Fragility,” 2.
Participants who had read about: Rattan et al., “Race and the Fragility,” 1–2. This is particularly noteworthy because, as we touched on earlier, the evidence from neuroscience and psychology on the reduced cognitive development, moral reasoning abilities, and neurological capacities of young people as compared to adults had a large impact on the Supreme Court’s decision to strike down sentences of life without parole in the context of an extremely similar case. Rattan et al., “Race and the Fragility of the Legal Distinction between Juveniles and Adults,” 4. The broader progress entailed in this 2010 case may be seriously undermined by the influence of race and may, in part, explain the rise in transferring juveniles to adult courts. Rattan et al., “Race and the Fragility,” 1.
One interesting detail of the study is that liberals with low levels of prejudice showed the effects just like conservatives with high levels of prejudice. Jennifer L. Eberhardt and Aneeta Rattan, “The Race Factor in Trying Juveniles as Adults,” New York Times, June 5, 2012, http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2012/06/05/when-to-punish-a-young-offender-and-when-to-rehabilitate/the-race-factor-in-trying-juveniles-as-adults.
In a real trial, race may: Rattan et al., “Race and the Fragility,” 4.
Not everyone, though: Margaret C. Stevenson and Bette L. Bottoms, “Race Shapes Perceptions of Juvenile Offenders in Criminal Court,” Journal of Applied Social Psychology 39, no. 7 (2009): 1680.
For some people, describing a defendant: John Hurwitz and Mark Peffley, “Playing the Race Card in the Post–Willie Horton Era,” Public Opinion Quarterly 69, no. 1 (Spring 2005): 102, 109.
And there is some evidence to suggest: Stevenson and Bottoms, “Race Shapes Perceptions,” 1663.
The broadness of a defendant’s nose: Eberhardt et al., “Looking Deathworthy,” 383–84.
The same dynamic is at work: Eberhardt et al., “Looking Deathworthy,” 383.
One study found that felons with: Eberhardt et al., “Looking Deathworthy,” 383.
Research shows that the handsomeness: David A. Abwender and Keyatta Hough, “Interactive Effects of Characteristics of Defendant and Mock Juror on U.S. Participants’ Judgment and Sentencing Recommendatio
ns,” Journal of Social Psychology 141 (2001): 606–10; Paul H. Robinson, Sean E. Jackowitz, and Daniel M. Bartels, “Extralegal Punishment Factors: A Study of Forgiveness, Hardship, Good Deeds, Apology, Remorse, and Other Such Discretionary Factors in Assessing Criminal Punishment,” Vanderbilt Law Review 65 (2012): 770.
In essence, when you have a pretty face: Robinson, Jackowitz, and Bartels, “Extralegal Punishment Factors,” 770.
But, in fact, psychologists have found: Bruce W. Darby and Barry R. Schlenker, “Children’s Reactions to Transgressions: Effects of the Actor’s Apology, Reputation, and Remorse,” British Journal of Social Psychology 28, no. 4 (1989): 353–64; Gregg J. Gold and Bernard Weiner, “Remorse, Confession, Group Identity, and Expectancies about Repeating a Transgression,” Basic and Applied Social Psychology 22, no. 4 (2000): 291–300; Ken-ichi Ohbuchi, Masuyo Kameda, and Nariyuki Agarie, “Apology as Aggression Control: Its Role in Mediating Appraisal of and Response to Harm,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 56, no. 2 (1989): 219–27; Christy Taylor and Chris L. Kleinke, “Effects of Severity of Accident, History of Drunk Driving, Intent, and Remorse on Judgments of a Drunk Driver,” Journal of Applied Social Psychology 22 (1992): 1641–55.
Indeed, when a person does not apologize: Darby and Schlenker, “Children’s Reactions to Transgressions”; Gold and Weiner, “Remorse, Confession, Group Identity, and Expectancies”; Ohbuchi, Kameda, and Agarie, “Apology as Agressions Control”; Taylor and Kleinke, “Effects of Severity of Accident”; Chris L. Kleinke, Robert Wallis, and Kevin Stalder, “Evaluation of a Rapist as a Function of Expressed Intent and Remorse,” Journal of Social Psychology 132, no. 4 (1992): 525–37; Dawn T. Robinson, Lynn Smith-Lovin, and Olga Tsoudis, “Heinious Crime or Unfortunate Accident? The Effects of Remorse on Responses to Mock Criminal Confessions,” Social Forces 73, no. 1 (1994): 175–90.
In turn, this can lead participants: Kleinke, Wallis, and Stalder, “Evaluation of a Rapist,” 533–34; Taylor and Kleinke, “Effects of Severity of Accident,” 1641; Mark Bennett and Deborah Earwaker, “Victim’s Responses to Apologies: The Effects of Offender Responsibility and Offense Severity,” Journal of Social Psychology 134, no. 4 (1994): 457–64; Alayna Jehle, Monica K. Miller, and Markus Kemmelmeier, “The Influence of Accounts and Remorse on Mock Jurors’ Judgments of Offenders,” Law and Human Behavior 33, no. 5 (2009): 393–404.
We see this in the real world: Scott E. Sundby, “The Capital Jury and Absolution: The Intersection of Trial Strategy, Remorse, and the Death Penalty,” Cornell Law Review 83, no. 4 (1998): 1558.
Prosecutors often hammer on: Sundby, “The Capital Jury and Absolution,” 1558.
And the hard data seems to suggest: Sundby, “The Capital Jury and Absolution,” 1558, 1563–66.
One recent study showed that: Martin V. Day and Michael Ross, “The Value of Remorse: How Drivers’ Responses to Police Predict Fines for Speeding,” Law and Human Behavior 35 (2011): 221, 228.
We’ve been focusing on Pete’s: Jamie Arndt et al., “Terror Management in the Courtroom,” Psychology, Public Policy, and Law 11, no. 3 (2005): 432.
The tragic attack in Canada: Arndt et al., “Terror Management in the Courtroom,” 407–08. For those interested in gaining more background on mortality salience and terror management, see Jeff Greenberg, Tom Pyszczynski, and Sheldon Solomon, “The Causes and Consequences of a Need for Self-Esteem: A Terror Management Theory,” in Public Self and Private Self, ed. Roy F. Baumeister (New York: Springer-Verlag, 1986), 189–212; Jeff Greenberg et al., “Role of Consciousness and Accessibility of Death-Related Thoughts in Mortality Salience Effects,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 67, no. 4 (1994): 627–37, doi: 10.1037/0022-3514.67.4.627; Jamie Arndt et al., “Subliminal Exposure to Death-Related Stimuli Increases Defense of the Cultural Worldview,” Psychological Science 8, no. 5 (1997): 379–85; Tom Pyszczysnki, Sheldon Solomon, and Jeff Greenberg, In the Wake of 9/11: The Psychology of Terror (Washington, DC: American Psychological Association, 2003); Brian L. Burke, Andy Martens, and Erik H. Faucher, “Two Decades of Terror Management Theory: A Meta-Analysis of Mortality Salience Research,” Personality and Social Psychology Review 14, no. 10 (2010): 155–95.
Humans occupy a strange place: Arndt et al., “Terror Management in the Courtroom,” 432–33; Jeffrey Kirchmeier, “Our Existential Death Penalty: Judges, Jurors, and Terror Managment,” Law and Psychology Review 32 (2008): 66.
It is terrifying to think: Arndt et al., “Terror Management in the Courtroom,” 408.
Luckily, we have developed: Arndt et al., “Terror Management in the Courtroom,” 409.
Religions, for example, commonly: Arndt et al., “Terror Management in the Courtroom,” 409.
Our legal institutions offer: Arndt et al., “Terror Management in the Courtroom,” 409.
The more terror we feel: Arndt et al., “Terror Management in the Courtroom,” 432–33.
A number of experiments have: Arndt et al., “Terror Management in the Courtroom,” 432–33.
In one study, researchers asked a group: Abram Rosenblatt et al., “Evidence for Terror Management Theory I. The Effects of Mortality Salience on Reactions to Those Who Violate or Uphold Cultural Values,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 57, no. 4 (1989): 681–90; Stephen Cave, “Imagining the Downside of Immortality,” New York Times, August 27, 2011, http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/28/opinion/sunday/torchwood-gives-glimpse-of-eternal-life.html?_r=1&partner=rss&emc=rss.
Before considering the facts: Rosenblatt et al., “Evidence for Terror Management Theory I,” 682; Cave, “Imagining the Downside of Immortatlity.”
The judges who had been subconsciously: Rosenblatt et al., “Evidence for Terror Management Theory I,” 682.
The researchers theorized that: Rosenblatt et al., “Evidence for Terror Management Theory I,” 683; Arndt et al., “Terror Management in the Courtroom,” 420.
Had this been a real case: Kirchmeier, “Our Existential Death Penalty,” 68–70.
While subtle reminders: Arndt et al., “Terror Management in the Courtroom,” 422; Kirchmeier, “Our Existential Death Penalty,” 68–70.
Those with very high self-esteem: Kirchmeier, “Our Existential Death Penalty,” 70.
And some people simply do not: Kirchmeier, “Our Existential Death Penalty,” 68–70.
In fact, when an offense: Arndt et al., “Terror Management in the Courtroom,” 421–27.
An external event like: Arndt et al., “Terror Management in the Courtroom,” 427–28.
For one thing, many crimes involve: Arndt et al., “Terror Management in the Courtroom,” 412–13.
Attorneys and witnesses regularly: Arndt et al., “Terror Management in the Courtroom,” 412–13.
A prosecutor may emphasize that: Arndt et al., “Terror Management in the Courtroom,” 421–22.
Likewise, a witness may describe: Kirchmeier, “Our Existential Death Penalty,” 72–73.
The mortality dynamic may: Arndt et al., “Terror Management in the Courtroom,” 431–32.
Not only are thoughts of death: Kirchmeier, “Our Existential Death Penalty,” 80–81.
In addition, only those who: More research is needed to confirm that this is, indeed, the case. Kirchmeier, “Our Existential Death Penalty,” 75–78.
Pro–death penalty juries are: Kirchmeier, “Our Existential Death Penalty,” 77; James S. Liebman, “The Overproduction of Death,” Columbia Law Review 100 (2000): 2097 n. 164.
This dynamic may itself be: For helpful overviews of the psychology of evil, see Roy F. Baumeister, Evil: Inside Human Violence and Cruelty (New York: W. H. Freeman, 1999); Arthur G. Miller, The Social Psychology of Good and Evil (New York: Guilford 2004).
Recall our problematic “mug shot” view: Russell J. Webster and Donald A. Saucier, “Angels and Demons Are Among Us: Assessing Individual Differences in Belief in Pure Evil and Belief in Pure Good,” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 39 (2013): 1455; Christopher T. Burris an
d John K. Rempel, “ ‘Just Look at Him’: Punitive Responses Cued by ‘Evil’ Symbols,” Basic and Applied Social Psychology 33 (2011): 69.
This notion allows us to: John H. Ellard et al. “Just World Processes in Demonizing,” in The Justice Motive in Everyday Life, eds. Michael Ross and Dale T. Miller (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 350-62, doi: 10.1017/CBO9780511499975.019.
It is far more unsettling to think: Ellard et al., “Just World Processes in Demonizing,” 351.
In trying to understand: Webster and Saucier, “Angels and Demons,” 1455–70, 1455–56; Burris and Rempel, “Just Look at Him,” 70.
And that’s exactly what: Maggie Campbell and Johanna Ray Vollhardt, “Fighting the Good Fight: The Relationship Between Belief in Evil and Support for Violent Policies,” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 40, no. 1 (2014): 18, 20–21. Those with stronger beliefs in pure evil are more supportive of harsh punishments and the death penalty and more opposed to criminal rehabilitation. Webster and Saucier, “Angels and Demons,” 1455–70, 1461. Although the authors believe that BPE is likely a causal factor affecting aggression and prosociality, they did not specifically look at the causal relationship. Webster and Saucier, “Angels and Demons,” 1467.
In one study, the potency: Campbell and Vollhardt, “Fighting the Good Fight,” 18, 20–21.
Though much of the public: At the basic level, research has shown that simply labeling an offender as evil correlates with people hating the offender more and supporting more harsh punishment for him. Campbell and Vollhardt, “Fighting the Good Fight,” 17.
Even seemingly insignificant things: People who are highly skeptical of the existence of evil appear less likely to be influenced by symbolic “evil” cues. Burris and Rempel, “Just Look at Him,” 78; Ellard et al., “Just World Processes in Demonizing,” 355. That said, the list of relevant “evilness” cues is ever-growing. In one study involving a violent murder, the more the offender experienced pleasure from the killing, the more people supported giving him a capital sentence, which was mediated by perceptions of the evilness of the offender. Dena M. Gromet, Geoff P. Goodwin, and John M. Darley, “Taking Pleasure in Doing Harm: The Influence of Hedonic States on Judgments of Immorality and Evil” (unpublished manuscript). In another experiment, if a criminal broke into a house “just for the thrill of it” and ended up shooting the owner, people were inclined to view him as more evil and hand out a longer sentence than if he broke in for money and fired the same shots. Ellard et al., “Just World Processes in Demonizing,” 356. It also mattered whether he later expressed a desire to apologize: lack of remorse may itself activate the evilness schema, which may partially help explain why those who express regret fair better at sentencing. Ellard et al., “Just World Processes in Demonizing,” 356.
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