Effects of jurors’ gender and attitudes toward intellectual disability in juvenile cases

What is it about?

This study looked at how jurors’ personal attitudes and gender affect the way they judge teens with intellectual disabilities who are on trial for a crime. A teen in a mock trial was either described as having a mild intellectual disability or not. The researchers wanted to know if jurors would see the teen as guilty, think they should be tried in adult court, or support punishment—and whether these decisions were influenced by whether the jurors were men or women and how they felt about people with disabilities. Women jurors and jurors who had more positive attitudes toward people with intellectual disabilities were more likely to feel sympathy and less likely to see the teen as responsible for the crime. These jurors gave more lenient judgments. But men jurors and those with negative attitudes were more likely to blame the teen and support adult punishment. This means that a defendant’s fate may depend not only on the facts of the case, but on who is on the jury, which raises serious concerns about fairness in court.

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Photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash

Photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash

Why is it important?

The findings reveal that jurors’ gender and personal attitudes toward intellectual disability significantly shape how they judge juvenile defendants with disabilities. The differences between women and men jurors and jurors who have different attitudes toward intellectual disability highlight the risk of bias in courtroom decisions and suggest that jury selection practices or training may be needed to ensure fair treatment of disabled youth in the justice system.