The Jury Room » Simple Jury Persuasion

Simple Jury Persuasion: The “extremist effect”

Douglas Keene — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 12:02:31 +0000

Most of us are familiar with the strategy of destroying a reputation with a barrage of nastiness. We all bemoan the ‘negative campaigning’ that is ramping up in this election year. But the problem is–it works. That is, “if you throw enough mud against the wall, something sticks”. And as it turns out, it doesn’t even have to be that much mud. New research from the realm of politics has something to teach us about addressing everything from pretrial publicity to opening statements. It’s a somewhat sad commentary on our tendency to “fill in” missing negative information. And a clear directive to pay attention to what we say and don’t say.

Researchers wanted to know how to go about diminishing those people who support universally held values (like wanting what is good for the environment) without being seen as directly attacking the value itself. Their belief was that political communicators “vilify their opponents as extremists in order to discredit their appeals to common values”. Further, they believe that “extremism is depicted as the error of turning a virtue into a vice through dogmatic, single-minded devotion”.

Through a series of experiments, the researchers discovered that simply labeling those on the other side as feminists or environmentalists created a significant backlash against the opposition. When the descriptor “radical” was added (i.e., radical feminists and radical environmentalists”), the negative reaction was stronger. When information on immigration was presented with the opposition being labeled as “extremist immigration lawyers and pressure groups”, participants again rejected the extremist group and supported those saying immigrants cost cities too much money.

The researchers believe this ‘extremist effect’ (i.e., calling someone an extremist) results in negative associations for the listener, and is especially effective in our current political environment.

“The extremist tactic is attuned to a political environment that features conflicting values and an ambivalent public unsure about what its priorities should be.”

We would agree that the current political environment makes this tendency worse–but the tendency is always present. There is a tendency to assume the worst in general, but particularly in litigation situations. The strategy of turning a virtue into a vice in public opinion is a powerful one that has easily transferrable strategy for the courtroom.

For example:

You are a snowmobiling association being sued by environmental groups to block access to public lands. You diminish their position by saying, “Sporting enthusiasts may not get to enjoy our national parks this winter because [radical] environmentalists care more about rabbits than the local economy”.

In other words, you do not attack directly and seem uncaring about the environment. Instead, you tar their position as extremist and tie your position to something positive–in this case, the local economy.

Nelson, T., Gwiasda, G., & Lyons, J. (2011). Vilification and Values. Political Psychology, 32 (5), 813-835 DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-9221.2011.00844.x

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You never forget your first time– & other things we learned this year

Rita Handrich — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 12:02:26 +0000

In 2010 we got our first nod from the ABA Blawg 100. After the steady work of researching, writing, and publishing three times every week, we were enormously gratified. Even… thrilled! This year, we were honored again and given a new category: Trial Practice. We smiled. And enjoyed the recognition of hard work on this blog over the past year. It wasn’t like our first time. But you never forget your first time!

Experts might be over-rated

We did so much pre-trial research this year it was a challenge to keep up with the blog! Several times we heard from our mock jurors that they were not that impressed with expert witnesses. We wrote about it once. And we learned that expert witnesses are often necessary in complex cases but that when you can bring in a credible “real person” who interacts with the issue on which you will have expert testimony–jurors will often respond positively and then use expert testimony to bolster their own reactions to the “real person”. So the question often becomes, “how can the expert witness support the experience of ‘real people’?”

Religious affiliation and commitment deserves more attention

The research on how religious belief and/or affiliation relates to decision-making has kept us busy this year! Evidence is mounting that we need to pay close attention to the nuances of this variable as we explore the values and beliefs that are central to jurors being able to “hear” our case. It isn’t so much about “being religious” as about how that designation translates into values, attitudes, and beliefs that frame jurors’ world views. We expect new research in this area will continue to emerge and you’ll see it here as we continue to explore the impact of religion in decision-making.

“Simple Jury Persuasion” is anything but simple.

We began our series some time ago with no prescient cognition that it would become an ongoing (and the most popular) feature of the blog. The research never fails to surprise and delight us! Whether it’s on how to activate the internal prosecutor, how to be seen as truthful by jurors, or when extraverts are a good choice for your jury, this series has become our favorite as well.

And more…

We’ve learned other stuff this year too. It’s part of what we love about this work. We crave new information, and through the blog we have the pleasure of sharing it with you, and hearing your comments. New cases, new facts, new areas to learn about and always the challenge of sorting out what is coincidence and what is a genuine case reaction, with the values and attitudes that attach to it. As we move on to 2012, we hope you will come along with us as we learn more and continue to share it with you.

Simple Jury Persuasion: The innuendo effect

Rita Handrich — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 12:02:43 +0000

“I know that’s what he said, but this is what he really meant…!”

From early sibling conflicts and on into adulthood, we know the power of innuendo. Now we have academic research findings that corroborate that childhood experience (especially for women). Researchers were curious about how hearing only positive information might still be construed negatively by the listener. They looked at the effect of describing a person when you leave out one of two key qualities that people tune into when judging others– warmth and competence. For example:

“Ryan seems like a fun-loving guy”. If Ryan applied to work in your workplace, how would you expect him to perform?

Or “Molly is very gifted, hard-working and passionate about her job”. If Molly were seated next to you at a social event, how much do you think you would enjoy socializing with her?

The researchers point out that the descriptions in the study contain only positive characteristics. Yet, we tend to interpret deficiencies when what we have heard is only a facet of the person. There is a tendency to assume that the omitted description is also absent from the person being described. For instance, when only warmth information is expected, giving information on competence will lead to negative inferences on warmth (see Molly, above). They call this “the innuendo effect”.

To study it, they offered vignettes in which peers described a person in one of two contexts: social (a travel group) or work (an academic group). In other words, the descriptions addressed warmth or competence, but not both. They asked participants to imagine being in a group (either social or work-related) for a month and that their task was to choose an additional person to add to the group based on the descriptive vignettes. Some participants were given straight-forward competence descriptions for the work context and straight-forward warmth descriptions for the social context. Others (those in the innuendo condition) had descriptions reversed so that warmth descriptions were given for the work context and competence descriptions were given for the social context.

In the initial study, the researchers found that the innuendo effect was stronger than anticipated. Not only did participants assume negatives when the description was contextually mismatched, (i.e., warmth/work and competence/social) they also assumed negatives when the descriptions matched the context! If someone was described as competent in a work situation, participants assumed they were not warm. A follow-up study showed the innuendo effect was even stronger with female targets than males. That is, we assume the negative more when assessing females.

The main lesson we take from this research relates to the need to be careful of what we don’t say, in addition to what we do. Overlooking a balancing quality of a person will leave people thinking that they lack the quality that is omitted. This is particularly true when jurors are looking for character in witnesses or parties. An executive is expected to be smart and hard working, but if you forget to mention that s/he also volunteers at the community food pantry, the jurors will see the witness as another selfish, career-obsessed person. Conversely, if someone is a manual laborer (including homemakers), emphasizing their thoughtfulness and dedication will make them more credible and respected.

Kervyn, N., Bergsieker, H., & Fiske, S. (2012). The innuendo effect: Hearing the positive but inferring the negative. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 48, 77-85

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