INFORMATION TO USERS
This manuscript has been reproduced from the microfilm master. UMI films the text directly from the original or copy submitted. Thus, some thesis and dissertation copies are in typewriter face, while others may be from any type of computer printer.
The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy subm itted. Broken or indistinct print, colored or poor quality illustrations and photographs, print bleedthrough, substandard margins, and improper alignment can adversely affect reproduction.
In the unlikely event that the author did not send UMI a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if unauthorized copyright material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion.
Oversize materials (e.g., maps, drawings, charts) are reproduced by sectioning the original, beginning at the upper left-hand comer and continuing from left to right in equal sections with small overlaps.
Photographs included in the original manuscript have been reproduced xerographically in this copy. Higher quality 6” x 9” black and white photographic prints are available for any photographs or illustrations appearing in this copy for an additional charge. Contact UMI directly to order.
ProQuest Information and Learning 300 North Zeeb Road. Ann Arbor. Ml 48106-1346 USA 800-521-0600
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Reproduced with with permission permission of the of copyright the copyright owner. owner.Further reproduction Further reproduction prohibited without prohibited permission. without permission. EXPLORING JUROR STRESS IN ONE-DAY/ONE-TRIAL JURISDICTIONS
by
Steven G. Michkowski
submitted to the
Faculty of the College of Arts and Sciences
of American.University
in Partial Fulfillment of
the Requirements for the Degree
of Doctor of Philosophy
in
Sociology: Justice
Chair: Jurg K. Siegentnaler^ ✓->Siegen'tnaler
line S. Cooper
phfA. Trotter Jr.
Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences
Date
2002
American University
Washington, D.C. 20016
MMBHI WWBrn
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. UMI Number 3048285
Copyright 2002 by Michkowski, Steven G.
All rights reserved.
______(f t UMI
UMI Microform 3048285 Copyright 2002 by ProQuest Information and Learning Company. All rights reserved. This microform edition is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States Code.
ProQuest Information and Learning Company 300 North Zeeb Road P.O. Box 1346 Ann Arbor, Ml 48106-1346
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. © COPYRIGHT
by
STEVEN G. MICHKOWSKI
2002
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. DEDICATION
In memory of my father who taught me that the virtues of hard work
and determination will always lead to appropriate award; to my Uncle Jack
who provided me with endless lessons in self-confidence; to my Aunt Ginny
who has been more like a mother to me and has supported me spiritually and
mentally throughout my life; to my Uncle Bill who early on has encouraged me
to seek knowledge and independence; and to my brothers Scott, John, and
Paul who have helped to keep the dream of completing this dissertation alive.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. EXPLORING JUROR STRESS IN ONE-DAY/ONE-TRIAL JURISDICTIONS
BY
Steven G. Michkowski
ABSTRACT
The groundwork for this study is based on an examination of juror
stress that was performed by the National Center for State Courts (NCSC)
entitled, "Through the Eyes of the Juror: A Manual for Addressing Juror
Stress.” The major objective of the NCSC analysis was to identify sources of
juror stress. The purpose of my thesis is to build upon the research performed
by the NCSC. Specifically, this study distills the scope of data analysis to
determine whether, overall, juror stress (as measured by combining the
variables demonstrating the major relationships between jury service and
stress) is less prevalent with jurors serving in one-day/one-trial jurisdictions
contrasted with jurors who served in non-one-day/one-day-trial jurisdictions.
In testing the outcome of this hypothesis, the study will also incorporate
demographic characteristics with the intent to explore further what juror
stress profiles can be formulated. In constructing models (groups) of key jury
stress factors, I have further refined an understanding of the concept of juror
ii
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. iit
stress, especially as it would help to identify juror stress profiles that can be
understood within the broader scope of the one*day/one-trial question.
By enriching our understanding of the concept of juror stress as
potentially related to certainty of service (one-day/one-trial), it is my
expectation that an important and relevant breadth of knowledge can be
injected to the field of justice administration. The prospective implications of
this study will be of considerable interest and importance to judicial
policymakers and especially to those jurisdictions that are weighing the
benefits and ramifications of the one-day/one-trial concept. In identifying
supplementary relationships between stress and jury service, it is logical to
anticipate that this study would stimulate judicial policymakers to explore
reasonable techniques aimed at reducing stress of jurors in those areas the
courts effectively direct or manage.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Many individuals have helped me throughout the process of my
completion of this work. I would like to thank Fred Russillo and Tom
Munsterman for their role as informal advisors, and to each of my committee
members: Professors Jurg Siegenthaler, Caroline Cooper, and Joseph Trotter,
who have devoted their time and endless hours of support. I would also like to
thank Professor Bette Dickerson for her patience and heartfelt and meaningful
words of wisdom and Chuck Rainville for his guidance on methodology.
iv
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. TABLE OF CONTENTS
ABSTRACT...... ii
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS...... iv
LIST OF TABLES...... vii
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS...... ix
CHAPTER I. IMPORTANCE OF THE RESEARCH...... 1
II. RESEARCH DESIGN...... 10 Study Design...... 10 Research Question ...... 11 Service Stress Model ...... 14 Process Stress Model ...... 14 Design and Methodology...... 16 Distribution of Responses...... 20 Sample...... 24 Instruments...... 25 Grouping of D ata...... 28 Coding of Data...... 30 Sampling Error...... 30 Survey Instrumentation...... 34 Independent T-Test Analysis...... 37 Tests of Statistical Significance ...... 39 Interpretation of Significant Independent Variables...... 46
III. LITERATURE REVIEW...... 48 The Importance of Juror Stress and Court Reform Research . . . 48 The Jury and Social Justice...... 82
v
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Historical Development of the Jury...... 89
IV. FINDINGS/INTERPRETATION OF THE DATA...... 101 Overview...... 101 Model T es t...... 105 Coefficient Table Findings (SERVICE MODEL) ...... 109 Coefficient Table Findings (PROCESS MODEL) ...... 113
V. FINDINGS/ANALYSIS OF THE DATA...... 122 Overview...... 122 Analysis of the SERVICE MODEL Coefficient Table...... 124 High School Education and Stress ...... 125 Income and Stress ...... 129 Self-Employed/Part*Time...... 135 Job Type"! . T...... 139
VI. SUMMARY ...... 145
APPENDICES A. Original Study Design and Methodology...... 150 B. Background Information Questionnaire...... 156 C. Jury Duty Stress Scale...... 158
BIBLIOGRAPHY...... 161
vi
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. LIST OF TABLES
Table 1 Distribution of Responses by Length of T ria l...... 20 2 Distribution of Responses by Age...... 20 3 Distribution of Responses by Gender...... 21 4 Distribution of Responses by Race...... 21 5 Distribution of Responses by Relationship Status...... 21 6 Distribution of Responses by Education...... 22 7 Distribution of Responses by Work Status...... 22 8 Distribution of Responses by Household Income ...... 22 9 Distribution of Responses by Children Living With Respondent...... 23 10 Distribution of Responses by Job Type...... 23 11 Distribution of Responses by Deliberation (in Hours)...... 23 12 Distribution of Responses by Number of Jurors on Panel...... 24 13 Distribution of Responses by Type of T ria...... l 24 14 Distribution of Study Courts by One-Day/One-Trial Policy...... 29 15 Coding of Independent Variables...... 31 16 Independent T-Tests of Variables Constituting the Service Stress Measure ...... 38 17 Independent T-Tests of Variables Constituting the Process Stress Measure ...... 39 18 Model Summary Table-Service Stress ...... 43 19 Model Summary Table-Process Stress...... 43 20 Coefficient Table (Service) ...... 44 21 Coefficient Table (Process) ...... 45 22 Model Summary Table-Service Stress (second cite) ...... 106 23 Model Summary Table-Process Stress (second cite) ...... 107 24 Model Summary Table-Process Stress (Minus Deliberation and Jurors)...... 108 25 Coefficient Table (Service) (second cite) ...... 109 26 Coefficient Table (Process) (second cite) ...... 113 27 Raw Data Process Stress by One-Day/One-Trial vs. Non-One-Day/ One-Trial by Numeric Frequency Distribution ...... 119 28 Difference in Frequency Scores for Raw Data Process Stress
vii
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. by One-Day/One*Trial vs. Non One-Day/One-Trial by Numeric Difference ...... 121
viii
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Illustration 1 Raw Data Process Stress by One-Day/One-Trial vs. Non One-Day/One-Trial (Graph)...... 118 2 Difference in Frequency Scores for Raw Data Process Stress by One-Day/One-Trial vs. Non One-Day/One-Trial (Graph).. . .120
ix
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. tH A PTER I
i . * * IMPORTANCE OF THE RESEARCH /*
Since the inception of the one-day/one-trial concept, few studies have
focused upon testing whether service in one-day/one-trial courts are less
stressful on the juror and whether the one-day/one-trial policy has been of
practical use to the administration of justice.1 Though my dissertation is not
directly designed or intended to examine the merit of the one-day/one-trial
principle, I have attempted to test, in part, whether one-day/one-trial
jurisdictions present summoned jurors with an opportunity to serve in their
role as jurors as experiencing less stress than their counterparts in
1With the exception perhaps of Professor Baar’s publication (Possibilities and Limitations), and Nordgren and Thelen’s publication (Helping Jurors Manage Stress), the following reports focus on practical application of a one-day/one-trial policy in various jurisdictions predominantly from a technical assistance perspective rather than from a rigorous academic testing of the one-day/one-trial concept. These referenced studies, however, must be cited since they represent some of the few known examinations of the one-day /one-trial model: Center for Jury Studies. "One-Day/One-Trial Experience in Colorado Springs, El Paso County, Colorado,” McLean, VA, August 1979; Institute for Court Management Court Executive Development Program Phase III Project. "A Feasibility Study of an One Day/One Trial Jury Service in Kent County Michigan,” Kent County, Ml, May 1998; Abt Associates, Inc. "An Exemplary Project: One Day/One Trial Jury System,” Wayne County, Ml, July 1977; Trial Court Programs Division Office of the State Court Administrator Oregon Judicial Department. "An Evaluation of the Marion County Court One-Trial/One-Day Term," Marion County, OR, February 1997; National Center for State Courts Center for Jury Studies, Western Regional Office. "Proposed One Trial/One Day Jury System for the Courts Serving Maricopa County, Arizona," Maricopa County, AZ, March 1985; Canadian Judicial Council/Carl Baar. "Possibilities and Limitations," St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada, November 1991.
1
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 2
non-one-day/one-trial jurisdictions. Why is juror stress as it relates to the
question of certainty of service (one-day/one-trial) of importance to the field
of justice administration, and how would the perception of justice and the
willingness to serve be impacted?
The way jury service is managed can affect how the public perceives
the justice system. Few government agencies impose to such a great extend,
under threat of arrest, on the lives of our citizens. The courts find it
increasingly important to search for ways to balance the needs of the courts
and those of the individuals called to serve. Court officials are continually
forced to search for ways to make the system as efficient as possible and to
respect the time of the citizens who support the work of the courts in
performing their role as jurors.
Satisfaction with the jury experience is found to be influenced by
perceptions of the entire jury service process from the point at which an
individual receives a summons through his or her extent of participation in the
jury system. Jury management systems which are purposely designed to
maximize the efficient use of jurors’ time are more likely than traditional jury
systems to elicit satisfaction from citizens called to jury duty. How does the
concept of juror stress enter this equation? Only in the last few years have
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. courts begun to realize the importance of marshaling systematic efforts to
make jury duty rewarding for citizens.
According to Thomas Munsterman, Director, Center for Jury Studies,
National Center for State Courts, fewer than half of the Nation’s courts employ
a one-day/one-trial policy (2001). This study will examine stress related
factors associated with the performance of jury service-especially as this
relates to the one-day/one-trial concept. Simply put, courts that provide
innovative methods for managing their jury system more effectively by using
such techniques as shortening the length of service time, increasing the fees
paid to jurors, and using other innovations which are designed to reduce
overall juror dissatisfaction and stress will be more successful in increasing
levels of juror participation. More importantly, for courts that are willing to
work toward a more efficient utilization of jurors’ time, satisfaction and
positive attitudes about jury service would likely increase among its citizens
called to jury duty. Decreasing major stress-related factors associated with
uncertainty of term of service, receiving summons, reporting for duty, or
disruption to daily routine are, to a great degree, influenced by the justice
system. Since these factors are anticipated to represent high-level stress
variables, a reasonably strong association would be expected to be found
between participation and satisfaction.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 4
Juror stress is an important factor which contributes to the
unwillingness of citizens to serve as jurors and, as such, greater numbers of
citizens are inventing new ways to avoid jury service. As this phenomenon
continues to grow, juries themselves become less representative of the
communities they serve. Public trust and confidence in jury verdicts and in
the justice system in general become weakened as positive jury service
declines. Court officers who have the ability to exert therapeutic or
anti*therapeutic consequences need to understand what factors can be
manipulated by court policymakers that can help reduce juror stress and
dissatisfaction with jury service. This research will offer insights into variables
which will be tested for associations with juror stress issues. It is my hope that
judges and court staff can learn from my findings to effect solutions that are
designed to alleviate the inevitable stress that begins with the jury summons.
Following an examination of factors associated with higher levels of
juror stress, I will offer potential suggestions that will be intended to achieve
improved juror utilization and improved juror service experience. Many courts
have revamped their jury system within the past decade, and strategies now
exist that are intended to maximize the effectiveness and satisfaction of jury
service. It is my expectation that this study will help to link empirical data to
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 5
real world solutions for the benefit of all courts, and especially for those
jurisdictions that currently do not employ the one-day/one-trial model.
In preliminary data test runs, the effect of the one-day/one-trial venue
is a reduction of stress, on average by 1.11 for jurors. Therefore, the average
service stress felt for one-day/one-trial jurors is significantly less than that felt
by jurors serving in non-one-day/one-trial jurisdictions.2 This finding supports
the major theoretical hypothesis of the current research. Additional selected
service stressor variables will be tested independently for the
one-day/one-trial courts and the non-one-day/one-trial courts to test the
strength of the hypothesis.
Selected process stressor variables will be tested independently for the
one-day/one-trial courts and the non-one-day/one-trial courts to test the
strength of the hypothesis and will include education, employment status,
marginal income, and occupational types. Other process variables that will be
included in the analysis will include demographic characteristics such as age,
gender, race, marital status, number of children, number of children living at
home, deliberation (in hours), and number of jurors on panel. The process
stressor variables selected were chosen on the basis of their ability to predict
2Please refer to the Coefficient Stress Table; note that the mean reduction of stress is 1.11 moving from non-one-day/one trial courts to one-day/one-trial courts. The constant vatue(7.93) is the theoretical measure of stress if all other factors were set to zero for non-one- day/one-trial jurisdictions.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 6
results (jury stress) due to jurors’ experiences of having actually served as a
juror generally.
The data demonstrate relationships between certainty of jury service
(one-day/one-trial) and specified demographic characteristics. In that this
study is designed to explore relationships between the data, no conclusive
findings of causality w ill be attempted; however, in examining the associations
between test variables, I intend to demonstrate that juror stress can be
demonstrated at statistical significant levels among several important
variables relating to juror service. For example, do jurors’ stress levels
increase or decrease in relationship to the number of children living at home?
Are there further relationships apparent between juror stress and education,
marital status, job status, whether they work full time, levels of income, race,
age, and type of jobs held?
As mentioned previously, courts possess considerable control over
managing strategies that are intended to maximize the use of citizens and
their time and to make jury duty a satisfying, if not pleasant, experience.
Relationships between various demographic variables and juror stress will serve
as interesting background data, but other test variables associated with stress,
such as marginal income or occupation type, may provide valuable insights to
policymakers.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 7
Strategies that ease stress levels for jurors serving on long trials, for
instance, could be developed. In this regard, some courts have improved
accommodations for jurors whose term of service is unusually long. Similarly,
many courts have recognized that jury service can present economic hardships
for certain populations depending upon the nature of their jobs, income, or
other factors. Relationships between such variables and juror stress could help
to legitimize proactive efforts by the courts to make further changes to jury
administration to accommodate those particular cross-sections of citizens
called to serve.
On the whole, this study is designed to provide judicial policymakers
with accurate information about the relationship between jury stress and the
one-day /one-trial model. Additionally, this study documents specific
relationships between juror stress and other jury service variables to show how
personal background characteristics and perceptions regarding various aspects
of the trial and jury service can influence judgments of satisfaction and
impression among those who are sworn to sit as jurors.
One of the most important principals and fundamental privileges
afforded our citizens throughout the 200 years of the American experiment is
jury participation. One of the most challenging aspects of running an effective
and responsive court system in increasing the level of efficiency in the level of
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. jury participation. Confidence in the American jury system can be enhanced,
in part, by implementing one-day/one-trial policies. Jurors who enter the
prospect of jury service in one-day /one-trial jurisdictions have an up-front
expectation of the certainty or length of service that is far more definitive
than their counterparts who are called to serve in non-one-day/one-trial
jurisdictions.
While reducing stress for jurors who serve in one-day/one-trial
jurisdictions, the reduced number of persons excused with one-day/one-trial
jury service terms also increases the representativeness and inclusiveness of
the jury pool and increases efficiency in the level of jury participation. Jurors
participating in the one-day/one-trial courts have been found to be more
satisfied, overall, with their jury experiences.
For jury managers and judicial policy players, managing juror stress is
becoming an increasingly important issue and identifying appropriate jury
stress intervention strategies are becoming progressively the focus of
attention. While some stress is expressed and is probably necessary for jurors,
the need to manage jury stress through a comprehensive jury management
protocol is needed. As knowledge about managing jury stress continues to
develop, more structured research can be expressed to focus on developing an
■<*» array of jury stress management tools which can be implemented by the
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 9
courts. This study will contribute to a more thorough theoretical testing of
whether juror stress can be decreased by implementing a one-day/one-trial
policy.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. CHAPTER II
RESEARCH DESIGN
Study Design
The hypotheses stated below has been developed as a result of my
secondary analysis of the National Center for State Courts juror stress study.
The authors of the original study sought only to develop a determination as to
the extent and sources of juror stress. My analysis of the original study data
will limit the scope of data analysis and, more importantly, will incorporate
the use of demographic characteristics with the intent to explore further
sources of juror stress. In modeling known jury stress factors with the
one-day/one-trial variable, I hope to further refine an understanding of the
concept of juror stress, especially as it would help to identify who is more
subject to stress. More importantly, my purpose has been to define whether
jurors serving in one-day/one-trial jurisdictions differ in their stress levels
from jurors serving in non-one-day/one-trial jurisdictions.
10
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 11
Research Question
Research Question: Is there a significant difference in service stress
between jurors serving in one-day/one-trial jurisdictions and those serving in
non-one-day/one-trial jurisdictions?
Hypothesis: Given that certain factors that relate to jury duty will
influence the level of stress experienced by jurors, jurors serving in one
day-one trial jurisdictions will be less stressed due to their greater up-front
knowledge of the certainty of length of jury service.3
The above hypothesis can be elaborated upon in more simplistic terms.
A number of jurisdictions that reduce to the shortest extent possible both the
amount of time during which persons are required to remain available for jury
duty and the time actually spent at the courthouse have limited the term of
jury service to a one-day/one-trial term. The individual's term of service is
completed upon serving either for the duration of one trial or for one day if
that person is not selected to serve as a juror. Those individuals who are
^tudy courts employing the one-day/one-trial policy at the time of the original study included: Superior Court of Maricopa County, AZ (Phoenix); First Judicial District of Pennsylvania Court of Common Pleas, PA (Philadelphia); Orange County Superior Court, CA (Santa Anna); and Circuit Court for Montgomery County, MD (Rockville). The remaining study courts employed varying policies including The Fourth Judicial District of Minnesota (Minneapolis), with no service policy; the Second Judicial District of Minnesota (St. Paul), with no service policy; and Davidson County Circuit Court, TN (Nashville) with a one-week jury service policy.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 12
either challenged at voir dire or are not selected for a voir dire panel are
dismissed at the end of their first day.
To potential jurors, the length of a jury term can produce substantial
consequences including disruption to domestic schedules, personal plans,
business activities, economic hardship or even interference with health-related
circumstances. In short, potential jurors have increasingly become reluctant
to answer jury summonses and many have lost interest in participating in the
process altogether. For those who appear at the courthouse and seek to be
excused for hardships or other legitimate extreme inconveniences, the
imposition of strict excuse policies often translates into unwilling jurors who
are commissioned into jury service.
What benefit would jurors derive from knowing that their term of
service would be limited to just one day or one trial? For potential jurors
called to serve in a one-day /one-trial jurisdiction, certainty of service-at least
to the extent of the parameters of this policy-is a known factor. When a juror
faces uncertainty regarding length of service, it is logical to assume that that
juror would experience more stress than the fellow juror who reports to the
courthouse with guarantees of potential duration of service. It is logical to
believe that jurors serving in non-one-day/one-trial jurisdictions would
experience a greater degree of frustration and dissatisfaction with the jury
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 13
system and with the judicial system in general than their counterparts who
serve in jurisdictions where certainty of service is known when summoned.
What exactly is meant by term of service as this relates to
one-day/one-trial? The American Bar Association’s applicable standard for
term of and availability for jury service states that:
The time that persons are called upon to perform jury service and to be available therefore should be the shortest period consistent with the needs of justice, (a) Term of service of one day or the completion of one trial, whichever is longer, is recommended. However, a term of one week or the completion of one trial, whichever is longer, is acceptable, (b) Persons should not be required to maintain a status of availability for jury service for longer than two weeks except in areas with few jury trials when it may be appropriate for persons to be available for service over a longer period of time. (ABA Standard Relating to Juror Use and Management 1986, 65)
It has been hypothesized that jurors serving in the one-day/one-trial
courts would report having significantly less stress than those serving in
traditional courts. Two eventual models were formulated related to differing
forms of juror stress and they have been titled, service stress and process
stress.
The first dependent variable is the level of service stress that jurors
experienced. The service stress model was formulated by adding the scores
from five survey items assessing the level of stress from various events related
to having to perform jury service. Responses to each of these items were
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 14
originally scaled on a 5-point Likert-style continuum between '0 ” = not
stressful at all and f4’ = extremely stressful. The Service Stressor Model will
be analyzed against the one-day/one-trial courts and the non-one-day/
one-trial courts to test the strength of the hypothesis and will include "how
stressful was”:
Service Stress Model
• Receiving Summons
• Waiting for Jury Assignment
• Reporting for Duty
• Disruption to Daily Routine
• Limits on Actions During Jury Service
The service stressor variables selected were chosen on the basis of
their ability to predict results (jury stress) due to jurors being commissioned
into jury service.
Selected process stressor variables will be analyzed against the
one-day/one-trial courts and the non-one-day/one-trial courts to test the
strength of the hypothesis and will include "how stressful was”:
Process Stress Model
• Dissension Among Jurors
• Receiving Jury Instructions
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 15
• Deciding on a Verdict
• Jury Deliberation
• The Possibility of Making a Mistake
The process stressor variables selected were chosen on the basis of
their ability to predict results (jury stress) due to jurors’ experiences of having
actually served as a juror generally. More specifically, the selected process
stressor variables were selected for their ability to assess the level of stress
from the actual performance of jury duty. Again, the responses to each of
these responses were originally scaled on a 5-point Likert-style continuum
between ’0’ = not stressful at all and ’4’ = extremely stressful.
Other explanatory variables entered as controls will include
demographic characteristics such as age,4 gender, race, education level,
marital status, number of children, number of children living at home,
occupation, job status, and income.
Should the study data demonstrate relationships between certainty of
jury service stress factors and service/process variables, as well as other test
variables relating to demographics, could the relationships have implications to
4Age of children was not asked in the original study questionnaire, although it was recognized as a stressor variable.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. judicial or executive branches in terms of policy-making? What can be done to
help the courts prevent or deal with juror stress? For example:
• Consideration for one-day/one trial policy (certainty of length of service)
• Construction of jury panels by specific case types5
• Pre-selection of Blue-Ribbon panels to decide complex cases
• Remuneration for jury duty
• Summons procedure
• Jury debriefing
• Child care
• Other jury reforms
Design and Methodology
The basis for my study, a secondary analysis, has been developed from
an examination of juror stress that was performed by the National Center for *
* State Courts (NCSC). The analysis of that study was printed in 1998 and was
titled, "Through the Eyes of the Juror: A Manual for Addressing Juror Stress.”6
5Criminal-person centered crimes were defined in the original research as robbery, assault, rape/sexual assault, murder or manslaughter; criminal-other were defined as all other crimes not included in criminal-person; civil case definitions in the original study only referred to injury/negligence, malpractice, and other (other presumably included domestic relations and tort cases).
6See Appendix A for original study.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. The purpose of this study is to build upon the research that was
developed by the NCSC. Using NCSC data that identified sources of juror
stress, I have limited the scope of data analysis and concentrated my efforts to
determine whether, overall, juror stress is less prevalent with jurors serving in
one day/one trial jurisdictions (as opposed to those who served in
non-one-day/one trial jurisdictions). In determining the answer to this
question, I will incorporate the use of service and process stressor models
which are comprised of a total of ten selected dependent variables or
responses taken from the Jury Duty Stress Scale Questionnaire and the
Background Information survey which were administered to jurors in the
original National Center for State Courts study. In structuring cross-tabulations
of known jury stress factors with other test variables (demographics), I hope to
further refine an understanding of the concept of juror stress, especially as it
would help to identify who is more subject to stress as can be determined
within the broader scope of the one-day/one-trial question.
In this study, I initially tested survey question variables from two of the
several surveys (in addition to the Background Information Survey) that were
distributed in the original study. The two surveys are titled: "Jury Duty
Survey” and "Jury Duty Stress Scale.” These instruments will be described
further in the upcoming section. In pretesting variables contained in the Jury
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 18
Duty Survey, it was determined that the types of jury duty /experience
questions asked in that survey were not specific enough to relate to why juror
stress was experienced. Furthermore, the types of questions posed in that
survey were anecdotal and subjective-they did not address any real or
perceived root causations for juror stress. As such, a decision was made not to
incorporate that survey (Jury Duty Survey) in the analysis.7
In this study, I will divide the data primarily between two groups,
including those jurors called but unassigned to jury duty and those jurors who
were actually assigned as jurors/alternates. Analysis of the assigned group
only will be performed in this study. Perhaps most importantly, this
examination of the data will differ from the original study design by recoding
the respondents who served in one day/one trial jurisdictions and those who
served in jurisdictions that did not implement the one-day/one-trial policy at
the time of the original study.
Though demographic data were collected and coded in the original
study, that information was not significantly explored and was not expected to
be critical to the study's objectives. Neither was the one-day/one-trial
7lt was determined that the Jury Duty Stress Scale Questionnaire and the Background Information survey would be far more useful in helping to define why juror stress was experienced. However, the survey instruments used in the original study presented (imitations in that they lacked further probing into specific response remedies to juror stress. Follow-up research into juror stress with suggested remedies from respondents would maximize and enhance this study design.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 19
hypothesis entertained, nor was the data coded for purposes of examining
one-day/one-trial and juror stress. In the present study, all of these
objectives will be explored. It is my expectation that jury service and process
models as well as demographic characteristics analyzed against
one-day/one-trial courts and non-one-day/one-trial courts will further help to
identify relationships with regard to juror stress. I am anticipating that juror
stress factors will vary in their original ranking* when grouped into statistical
models and that this differential ranking is significant, lending support to the
hypothesis that the Service/Process typology can differentiate stress levels and
that such differentiation lends credence/support the relationship findings
between the tested models (Service and Process).
In the regression model used in this study, the dependent variable is a
measure of the stress related to having to perform jury service. As such, the
variables are actively correlated with each other, meaning that a change in
the value for any independent variable will show a resulting change in the
dependent variable. As such, data will be shown to vary based upon levels of
statistical significance (T-tests) where this base will equal 2.08. Significant
findings will be highlighted in the data tables.
8ln the NCSC study, survey responses were ranked by most stressful to least stressful.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 20
The breakdown between the one-day /one-trial and the non-one-
day/one-trial study courts (N=386) is shown in Table 14 (p. 29).
Distribution of Responses
Coding decisions were made in collapsing the distribution of the data
within each variable (see Coding of Variables); however, the following
distributions highlight the variances within each variable set and are shown
only as background information.
Table 1. Distribution of Responses by Length of Trial
CUMULATIVE LENGTH OF TRIAL NUMBER PERCENTAGE PERCENTAGE
ONE-DAY/ONE-TRIAL 183 47.4 47.4
NOT ONE-DAY/ONE TRIAL 203 52.6 100.001 1 rounded to nearest .100
Table 2. Distribution of Responses by Length of Age
CUMULATIVE AGE RANGE NUMBER PERCENTAGE PERCENTAGE
18-30 60 15.54 15.54
31-43 130 33.68 49.22
44-51 101 26.17 75.39
52-79 95 24.61 100.001 1 rounded to nearest .100
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 21
Table 3. Distribution of Responses by Gender
CUMULATIVE GENDER NUMBER PERCENTAGE PERCENTAGE
MALE 145 37.56 37.56
FEMALE 241 62.44 100.001 1 rounded to nearest .100
Table 4. Distribution of Responses by Race
CUMULATIVE RACE NUMBER PERCENTAGE PERCENTAGE
WHITE 302 78.24 78.24
NON-WHITE 84 21.76 100.001 1 rounded to nearest .100
Table 5. Distribution of Responses by Relationship Status-
CUMULATIVE RELATIONSHIP STATUS NUMBER PERCENTAGE PERCENTAGE
NOT IN A COMMITTED 280 72.54 72.54 RELATIONSHIP
IN A COMMITTED 106 27.46 100.001 RELATIONSHIP
1 rounded to nearest .100
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 22
Table 6. Distribution of Responses by Education
CUMULATIVE EDUCATION NUMBER PERCENTAGE PERCENTAGE
UP TO HIGH SCHOOL GRAD 88 22.80 22.80
UP TO COLLEGE GRAD 239 61.92 84.72
GRADUATE TRAINING 59 15.28 100.001
1 rounded to nearest .100
Table 7. Distribution of Responses by Work Status
CUMULATIVE WORK STATUS NUMBER PERCENTAGE PERCENTAGE
NOT SELF-EMPLOYED, 298 77.20 78.20 STUDENT, OR PART-TIME
SELF-EMPLOYED, STUDENT, 88 22.80 100.001 OR PART-TIME
’ rounded to nearest .100
Table 8. Distribution of Responses by Household Income
CUMULATIVE HOUSEHOLD INCOME NUMBER PERCENTAGE PERCENTAGE
UP TO $19,000 45 11.66 11.66
$20,000-$29,000 56 14.51 26.17
$30,000-$39,000 83 21.50 47.67
$40,000-$49,000 49 12.69 60.36
$50,000-$59,000 59 15.29 75.65
$60,000-$99,999 73 18.91 94.56
OVER $100,000 21 5.44 100.00’ 1 rounded to nearest .100 |
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 23
Table 9. Distribution of Responses by Children Living with Respondent
CHILDREN LIVING WITH CUMULATIVE NUMBER PERCENTAGE RESPONDENT PERCENTAGE
NONE 120 31.09 31.09
1 55 14.25 45.34
2 115 29.79 75.13
3-9 96 24.87 100.00'
' rounded to nearest .100
Table 10. Distribution of Responses by Job Type
CUMULATIVE JOB TYPE NUMBER PERCENTAGE PERCENTAGE
MANAGERIAL 153 39.64 39.64 PROFESSIONAL/TECHNICAL 179 46.37 86.01
SERVICE (MECHANICAL/LABOR) 54 13.99 100.001 1 rounded to nearest .100
Table 11. Distribution of Responses by Deliberation (in Hours)
CUMULATIVE DELIBERATION (IN HOURS) NUMBER PERCENTAGE PERCENTAGE 0-1.5 85 22.02 22.02 2-3.75 104 26.94 48.96 4-5.5 91 23.58 72.54 6-50 106 27.46 100.001 1 rounded to nearest .100
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 24
Table 12. Distribution of Responses by Number of Jurors on Panel
NUMBER OF JURORS ON JURY CUMULATIVE NUMBER PERCENTAGE PANEL PERCENTAGE
6 80 20.73 20.73
7-11 59 15.28 36.01
12 247 63.99 100.001
' rounded to nearest .100
Table 13. Distribution of Responses by Type of Trial9
CUMULATIVE TYPE OF TRIAL NUMBER PERCENTAGE PERCENTAGE
CIVIL 159 41.19 41.19
CRIMINAL 227 58.81 100.001 1 rounded to nearest .100
Sample
As mentioned previously, of the two primary respondent groups used in
the original study design, I will use the assigned group data only (jurors/
alternates) as the focus of my data analyses in this study. Questionnaire
9ln the original study, the case types (type of trial) were coded by death penalty, person- centered, non-death penalty, non-person centered, criminal cases, and civil cases. As with the derision to recode other variables, the derision to code into civil or criminal was based on maintaining a meaningful N in order to explain the variations in the data. This variable was ultimately not incorporated in the final model as the preliminary analysis of the data did not demonstrate appreciable variation as compared with one-day/one-trial and non-one-day/one- trial respondents. It should also be noted that the variable related to the number of jurors is systematically related to a variable delineating between civil and criminal trials. Criminal trials will have a value of 12 jurors, civil trials may have 6 to 12 jurors. Entering the variable related to the number of jurors will account for variation related to the size of the jury as well a$ serving as a proxy for the civil/criminal trial variable. Entering both variables (which are nearly perfectly collinear) would lead to biased estimates.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 25
packets were returned from 401 individuals serving as jurors or alternates and
NCSC staff collected similar questionnaire data from approximately 453
additional unassigned members of the jury panel.10 Clean data for this study
existed for 386 respondents (203 one-day/one-trial respondents, 183
non-one-day/one-trial respondents).
Since project staff distributed some questionnaires during site visits in
order to obtain a larger sample, and did not sequentially number the
additional questionnaires, it is not known how many packets were actually
distributed; therefore a response rate can not be calculated for these samples.
NCSC staff were able to determine that nearly 60% of those who served as
jurors or alternates sat on juries for criminal cases, and of the 60%, 16% (N=37)
participated on a death penalty case in which they had to decide the sentence.
The remaining 40% of jurors sat on civil cases consisting primarily of tort cases
involving malpractice and personal injury.
Instruments
Of the several questionnaire packets that were distributed in the
original NCSC study, I will limit my review to the data that was collected from
10The combined total of assigned and unassigned jurors in the original study is actually 856, not 854. The SPSS program indicates 2 missing and, accordingly, a total N for assigned and unassigned jurors is calculated as 856. No official explanation can be offered to explain the two missing data. The two responses may have been miscoded, unreadable, misplaced, or may have been nullified upon request of the participant.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 26
two primary survey instruments: 1) Jury Duty Stress Scale and 2) Background
Information Survey. These Instruments were administered to two groups: 1)
jurors/alternate jurors and 2) unassigned members of the jury panel. The
Background Information Survey consisted of a demographic information sheet,
which included ten demographic background questions.11 The demographic
information sheet distributed to jurors/alternates also included fifteen
additional questions that included the following:12
• How many jurors served on your jury (not including alternates)?
• How long did the trial last (in days)?
• How long did the deliberations last (in hours)?
• Was your jury required to reach a unanimous verdict?
• Was your jury able to reach a verdict?
• Did your jury reach a unanimous verdict? If so, what was the verdict?
• What type of trial was this: Criminal (where a defendant is charged with a crime)/ Civil (where two or more parties are involved in a non-criminal trial)?
• Briefly describe the trial.
• Were you required to recommend a sentence/damages?
"See above section Design and Methodology for a full description of this instrument or see Appendix B.
12Several of the open-ended questions were not coded by the original research team and therefore were not used in the study.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 27
• What was the most severe sentence/or highest damages sought?
• What sentence/damages did your jury give (if any)?
• Briefly describe any noteworthy event(s) or evidence at the trial.
• Were court officials helpful?
• Was the judge helpful?
• Were you experiencing high levels of stress before jury duty?13
The Jury Duty Survey was created to assess responses to trauma, but in
the original study was used to target the jury duty experience in particular.
The scale was developed by the research team and included twenty "yes or
no” items which focused on personal jury duty experiences and their
associated stressfulness. In this survey, jurors were asked to describe
symptoms associated with stress that they might have experienced as a result
of their jury duty. The questionnaire only listed "symptoms" (such as "more
fearful, numb, or detached”). Each respondent interpreted the exact meaning
of these terms individually. Again, due to the subjective nature of the
questions asked in this survey, responses from the Jury Duty Survey were not
used in this study.
13ln this original study question, "stress” was determined individually by the respondent.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 28
The Jury Duty Stress Scale questionnaire measured the stress of
specific aspects and tasks associated with a trial and jury duty. The
questionnaire was completed by jurors and alternates and consisted of 49
items that focused on various aspects of jury duty. Using a five-point Ukert
scale, each item was rated from 0 ("not at all stressful”) to 4 ("extremely
stressful”). Examples of items on the scale included, "receiving summons,”
"media coverage of the trial,” "presentation of disturbing/grisly evidence,”
jury deliberations,” and "sentencing of the defendant” (for a list of all
questions, see Appendix C).
Grouping of Data
In the original study, those who were not selected to serve as jurors
(unassigned) were set as a baseline or comparison group to the group that went
on to be called into service (assigned/alternates). As mentioned earlier, I will
analyze only the data for the assigned group, or jurors/alternates who actually
heard cases. Jurors who served on trials in one-day/one-trial jurisdictions
(Philadelphia, Maricopa County, and Montgomery County) were coded
independently from jurors serving in non-one-day/one-trial jurisdictions
(Nashville, Minneapolis, and St. Paul).14
i '
14Due to low response rates for the original study court-(Superior Court of Orange County, CA/Santa Anna) that court was not used In the present study. Data collected from the Montgomery County, MD court in the original study was usfdlh the present study as a substitute
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 29
Table 14. Distribution of Study Courts by One-Day/One-Trial Policy SITE LOCATION NOT ONE DAY ONE-DAY/ONE-TRIAL GROUP TOTAL Philadelphia 0 116 116 Minneapolis 75 0 75 St. Paul 63 0 63 Maricopa County 0 - 39 39 Montgomery County 0 28 28 Nashville 65 0 65 Group Total 203 183 386 N-386
Demographic, case type and length of deliberation (in hours) data were
used as background variables for both non-one-day/one-trial and
one-day/one-trial jurisdictions. These variables will help to enrich the
understanding of a juror stress profile. For instance, would education levels
(and other demographic variables) of respondents impact stress? This type of
analysis was not performed in the original study, re-examination of the data.
Although using such dependent variables is expected to uncover further
relationships in the data, the jury stress profile is considered to be secondary
in addressing of the main hypothesis—that one-day/one-trial jurisdiction jurors
data set.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 30
will experience less stress than their counterparts in non-one-day /one-trial
jurisdictions.
Coding of Data
Univariate analyses15 and frequency distributions were run for all
demographic (background information) data. Decisions on collapsing these
variables were made on the basis that sufficient variations in the variables
were available in each of the relevant response categories. Percentage
distributions provide an explicit comparative framework for interpreting
distribution in that the size of category is relative to the size of the sample.
The SPSS program generated percentages as well as actual numbers of
responses for all comparative variables. The coding of the independent
variables is presented in Table 15.
Sampling Error
Having previously acknowledged that the original study project staff
distributed some questionnaires during site visits in order to obtain a larger
sample, and did not sequentially number the additional questionnaires, it is
not known how many packets were actually distributed. A true response rate
’“Frequencies were run for each of the relevant multiple answer background responses in the original study.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 31
cannot therefore be calculated. Though this is unfortunate, and the method of
data collection used in this case can best be described as convenience or
purposive sampling, some integrity in the data has nevertheless been
preserved.
Table 15. Coding of Independent Variables VARIABLE VALUES ONE-DAY 0 = One-day/one-trial NON-ONE-DAY/ONE-TRIAL 1 » Not one-day/one-trial AGE Interval level variable (number of years)1* 0 - Non-white17 RACE 1 » White 0 » Not in a committed relationship1* RELATIONSHIP STATUS 1 ■ In a committed relationship (Highest level achieved/Reference group = jurors with EDUCATION graduate training)1* HIGH SCHOOL 0 *= High school is not the highest level achieved 1 * Some high school or high school graduate 0 - College not the highest level achieved COLLEGE 1 = Some college or graduate training
16ln the original study, age was ranked nominally from 18 to 81.
17ln the original study, race was coded by: African-American; Caucasian; Native American; Hispanic; Asian or Pacific islands; and other. Due to the relatively small numbers of all other categories of race outside of white, all other races were collapsed into the other or Non-White category.
18ln the original study, marital status was coded by: married, separated, divorced, widowed, single, and cohabitating. The variable was recoded by: Not committed in a relationship and committed in a relationship.
19ln the original study, education was coded by: less than 4 years high school, 4 years of high school, some college or technical/vocational training, college graduate, and graduate school. The variable was recoded by: High school was not the highest level achieved, some high school or high school graduate, college not the highest level achieved, and some college or graduate training.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 32
TABLE 15 (cont.) WORK STATUS (Reference group * retirees)20 SELF-EMPLOYED/PART- 0 « Not self-employed, a student, or part-time worker TIME 1 = Self-employed, a student, or part-time worker FULL TIME 0 - Not full time 1 - Employed full time MARGINAL INCOME 0 - Annual income below 20K21 1 - Annual income above 20K Interval level variable (number of children currently CHILDREN living in the juror’s household)22 OCCUPATION (Reference group * mechanical/labor)21 MANAGERIAL 0 * Juror not employed as a manager 1 = Juror employed as a manager PROFESSIONAL 0 * Juror not employed in technical work or profession 1 * Juror employed in technical work or profession 0 - Juror not employed in service sector TECHNICAL/SERVICE 1 * Juror employed in service sector DELIBERATIONS Interval level variable (length of deliberation in hours)24 JURORS Interval level variable (number of jurors deciding case)2*
“ in the original study, job status was coded by: full-time, part-time, self-employed, homemaker, student, unemployed, and retired. Retired, homemaker, and unemployed responses were collapsed into "self-employed/part-time” as individual response numbers would not substantiate their own category.
21ln the original study, income was coded by: under $10,000, $10,000-$19,999, $20,000- 29,999, $30,000-$39,999, $40,000-49,999, $50,000-59,000, $60,000-$100,000, and above $100,000. The responses were recoded for a better fit for the economic component of the model to reflect incomes up to 20K and incomes above 20K.
“ in the original study, each respondent indicated a total "number for children living with you”; age of children was not collected in the original data. The variable was recoded as an interval number from 0-9.
“ in the original study, occupation was coded by: Managerial/specialty, professional, technical and sales, service, agricultural, mechanic/craftsman, equipment operator/laborer/transportation worker, and other. The variable was recoded as managerial or professional/technical and service.
24in the original study, respondents were asked to indicate both how long the trial lasted (in days)and how long the deliberations lasted (in hours). In the original study, respondents were asked to indicate how many jurors served on the jury panel (not including alternates).
“ in the original study, respondents were asked to indicate how many jurors served on the jury panel (not including alternates).
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 33
In staging the research and data use, one must address how accurate
the sample must be to serve as a description of the population and for
exploratory phases of research. When the goal is to discover interesting
patterns and to generate hypotheses for later study, generalizing to a specific
population and estimating sample precision are usually unimportant or
irrelevant (Royce Singleton, Jr. et al. 1988).
The present study uses data collected from a total of 386 respondents,
and, therefore, an adequate defense of population heterogeneity can be
made.26 As the data will show, respondents ranged in age from 18 to 79, and
all spectrums of the remaining demographic variables were adequately
represented. The data set is large enough to achieve a sufficient level of
reliability given the wide range of heterogeneity.27
“ it is recognized that many factors impact upon the eventual demographic composition of those who report and subsequently of the segment of that group actually selected into jury service. Those summoned to report for jury duty are most often drawn from driver’s license and registered voter pools-not all citizens drive or vote and consequently, this segment of the population would admittedly be under-represented. Likewise, juror yield rates are generally poor as significant numbers of those summoned fail to appear or are granted an excuse not to serve. The voir dire process, by design, furthermore eliminates particular citizens from the eventual jury pool. Others are eliminated through peremptory challenges or are simply never called.
27Reliability is concerned with the questions of stability and consistency. The operational definitions of the variables as applied remain consistent in thefr use throughout the study. Data have been collapsed into categories that are designed to provide more even percentage distributions in order to provide an explicit comparative framework for interpreting the data. In measuring more heterogeneous populations, greater numbers of cases are required to yield a reliable sample estimate. Since N*386 in this study, data that are collapsed into zones of central tendency frequencies should produce a reasonable degree of heterogeneity as well as a
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 34
Though sample bias as it relates to unreturned questionnaires cannot
be addressed further in any constructive way, it should be pointed out that
these non-observations would need to differ in systematic ways from
observations (survey data collected). The question remains as to whether
those unreturned surveys (for which no accurate number can be assigned)
would vary in potential observations enough to cancel out or flatten potential
responses.2*
Survey instrumentation
The surveys that were used in the original study were hand-delivered
to specific sites by project and court personnel. The questionnaires were
returned from the unassigned jurors prior to their departure from the
courthouse and assigned jurors returned their packets at the conclusion of the
trial. Both surveys were structured, closed-ended and were individually filled
out by members of the sampling frame. Since self-administered surveys were
provided to the entire sampling frame, and assurances were provided for
confidentiality, interviewer bias was not a factor. The questions were
more meaningful statistical analysis of the variances in data groups. Due to the expansiveness of some data categories, such as age for instance, it became necessary to group data into more limited dispersions among the sets of values.
28Those who were interested in cooperating in the study or who were interested in study results presumably returned surveys.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 35
designed to be easily understood; however, original study researchers did not
indicate that opportunities were given to respondents to clarify questions or
for respondents to probe for more adequate answers.29
Original study researchers did indicate that the survey instruments
were pre-tested but the extent of changes made to the original design of the
instruments is not known. Access to all respondents was gained by seeking
official permission with the site courts and locations, and a cover sheet
introducing the study to the sample group was provided. A consent form for
participation in the juror stress study was also provided which contained a
signature line for the respondent to sign. The participation (consent) form
provided that individual responses would be kept confidential and that the
respondent’s name would not be associated with the study. Furthermore, the
consent form indicated that each respondent maintained the right of refusal,
either in part, or in entirety, and that participation was voluntary.
Additionally, the consent form provided for names and addresses (and
phone numbers) of principal study researchers in the event that a respondent
might want to lodge a complaint or dissatisfaction. Participants were also
offered an option to receive study results if interested.
“ in the Duty Survey Stress Scale, respondents were given an opportunity to fill in an open question (other sources of juror stress) at the end of the questionnaire. This question was abandoned and was not coded or used. This entire survey was not used in the present study.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 36
Though I will use only the two surveys titled Background Information
(11 questions used) and the Jury Duty Stress Scale (49 questions for the
jurors/alternates), original study researchers also provided each potential
juror respondent with a packet containing the following survey instruments:30
• Jury Duty Survey-20 question yes/no
• Jury Environment Scale-45 true/false
• SCL-90-R Symptom Checklist-90 question Likert (5) Scale
• Eysenck Personality Inventory-57 question yes/no
Generally, returned questionnaires were filled out completely for most v ■ **
of the questions asked. Given that a copious number of questions were asked
(202 questions-unassigned jurors, 214 questions-assigned jurors) some
respondents may not have felt as involved or as highly motivated to complete
some or all of the administered questionnaires. Missing variables (responses)
in the two questionnaires used in my study varied. In most instances, the
variations in numbers of missing cases across the range of data are not
considered to be obstructive.
^Additionally, follow-up surveys were also sent to 401 assigned and unassigned jurors. 100 of these follow-up surveys were completed and returned by mail.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 37
Independent T-Test Analysis
As mentioned previously, the overall object of this research is to
explore whether the level of stress experienced by jurors is greater or less for
* * * jurors serving in one day-one trial jurisdictions. The preliminary analysis has
demonstrated significant decreases in stress for the study’s two models
(Service and Process) but especially for the service model-presumably again
due to those jurors having up-front knowledge of the certainty of length of jury
service.
Because significant test variables were grouped into models consisting
of five variables each for both service and stress models, bivariate analysis on
the models would not make sense to perform. (Further explanation is provided
in the following sub-chapter, 'Tests of Statistical Significance”). However, in
order to demonstrate the strength of individual variables contained in each of
the two models (Service and Process), I have reported the results of those
independent T-tests below. The tables are provided only as background
information or as a comparison of how the individual variables would fare as
stand alone variables as compared with their being incorporated into a
multivariate model. Given the strength of significance shown for the stand
alone variables, the reader should appreciate the need for the construction of
models for this study.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. The T-test assesses whether the means of the control groups
(one-day/one-trial and non-one-day/one-trial) and each model (or individual
variable as shown below) are statistically different from each other. None of
the individual variables (as stand alone variables) approach statistical
significance except the variables: receiving summons and reporting for duty
(Service stress only).
Table 16. Independent T-Tests of Variables Constituting the Service Stress Measure VARIABLE ONE-DAY/ONE-TRIAL MEAN SIGNIFICANCE NO 1.393 RECEIVING SUMMONS p<.001 YES 0.917 NO 1.328 REPORTING FOR DUTY p<.001 YES 0.972 NO 1.184 WAITING FOR ASSIGNMENT 0.81 YES 1.210 DISRUPTIONS TO DAILY NO 1.617 0.15 ROUTINE YES 1.425 NO 0.900 LIMITS ON ACTION 0.42 YES 0.818
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 39
Table 17. Independent T-Tests of Variables Constitutinc the Process Stress Measure VARIABLE ONE-DAY/ONE-TRIAL MEAN SIGNIFICANCE NO 0.592 JURY INSTRUCTIONS 0.28 YES 0.492 NO 1.478 DECIDING ON A VERDICT 0.83 YES 1.508 NO 1.378 JURY DELIBERATIONS 0.85 YES 1.403 FEAR OF MAKING A NO 1.343 0.96 MISTAKE YES 1.337 DISSENSION AMONG NO 1.005 0.53 JURORS YES 1.083
Tests of Statistical Significance
Regression is a statistical test that reveals the effect of multiple
independent variables upon a single dependent variable. The dependent
variable is commonly thought of as the variable that is caused by the
independent variables, though this is not technically the case. The variables
are actually correlated with each other, meaning that as the value for an
independent variable goes up, the value of the dependent variable goes up,
etc.
In the regression model, which will be used in this study, the
dependent variable is a measure of the stress related to having to perform iurv
service (SERVICE). This measure is comprised of five Likert-style responses
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 40
related to stress ('O' being the least stressful; '4' being the most stressful).
The resulting dependent variables were expanded in the SPSS program to have
a range of possible values between 0 (no stress) and 20 (extreme stress).
The first dependent variable is the level of SERVICE stress that jurors
experienced. In the Jury Stress Model that I have configured, five questions
from the Jury Duty Stress Survey surface as statistically significant in that
respondents of the survey indicate that these five dependent variables
measure high in producing juror stress. The service stressors are: 1) receiving
summons to serve on a jury; 2) waiting for jury assignment; 3) reporting for
jury duty; 4) disruption to the respondent’s daily routines and; and 5) limits on
respondent’s actions during jury service. The resulting measure (SERVICE) is
the simple sum of the responses to the five stress-related questions.
A second dependent variable used in this study measured the stress
related to the actual performance of iurv duty (PROCESS). This measure is
comprised of five Likert-style responses related to stress (’O’ being the least
stressful; ’4’ being the most stressful) and again expanded to twenty in the
SPSS program. In the Jury Stress Model that I have configured, five questions
from the Jury Duty Stress Scale Survey surface as statistically significant in that
respondents of the survey indicate that these five dependent variables
measure high in producing juror stress. The process stressors are: 1) receiving
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 41
jury instructions; 2) deciding on a verdict; 3) fear of making a mistake; 4)
dissension among jurors; and 5) jury deliberation. The resulting measure
(PROCESS) is the simple sum of the responses to the five stress-related
questions.
The sample used consists of 386 respondents that have completed
questionnaires related to juror stress and have been assigned to serve on a
jury, with non-one-day/one-trial and one-day/one-trial respondents being
almost equally represented (203 non-one*fay/one-trial, 183 one-day/one-
trial). Though respondents differed in many demographic regards, the major
theoretically relevant difference is that some respondents served in
one-day/one-trial jurisdictions in which their length of jury duty was indefinite
and was not known in advance by those respondents called to serve.31 The null
hypothesis that the current model is designed to test is that there is no
significant difference in service stress between jurors serving in
one-day/one-trial jurisdictions and those serving in non-one-day/one-trial
jurisdictions. It is hoped that, controlling for other independent variables
which may affect stress, the main effect for a one-day/one-trial independent
variable will be significant and will lead to a rejection of the null hypothesis.
31203 respondents were called Into service in non-one-day/one-trial jurisdictions, 183 respondents were called into service in one-day/one-trial jurisdictions (N*386).
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 42
(Note: rejection of the null hypothesis provides empirical support for the
research hypothesis, which in this case is "Jurors who serve in
one-day/one-trial jurisdictions experience less service stress than jurors called
from non-one-day/one-trial jurisdictions.”)
Before determining whether the main effect for a one-day/one-trial
variable is significant, the significance of the overall regression model must be
assessed. In performing this test, one can assure that the independent
variables in the regression are related to the dependent variable to a
significant extent. The same explanatory variables were entered into models
explaining the variation in both the service and process stressor measures. The
theoretically relevant explanatory variable was a one-day/one-trial measure.
Given the coding for this variable (0 = not a juror serving in a one-day/
one-trial jurisdiction and 1 = juror serving in a one-day/one-trial court), an
inverse relationship with both dependent variables was predicted.
When tested, the independent variables were found to systematically
relate to the dependent variable and the model is significant (given by the Sig.
<.001 under the ANOVA table.) The independent variables account for .15 % of
the total variation in the SERVICE variable (shown by the Rz measure in the
Service Model Summary Table). The independent variables account for .18 %
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 43
of the total variation in the PROCESS variable (shown by the R2 measure in the
Process Model Summary Table).
Table 18. Model Summary Table-Service Stress N df Sig 386 14 .15 4.032 p< .001
a. Predictors: (Constant) ONE-DAY/ONE-TRIAL, AGE, GENDER, RACE, RELATIONSHIP STATUS, HIGH SCHOOL, COLLEGE, SELF-EMPLOYED/PT, FULL TIME, MARGINAL INCOME, CHILDREN, MANAGERIAL, PROFESSIONAL/TECHNICAL, SERVICE, DELIBERATIONS (HOURS), AND JURORS (# ON PANEL). b. Dependent Variable: SERVICE *N - sample size; df = degrees of freedom (# of cells less the number of restrictions or constraints placed on the model); R2 = test of variation or degrees of variation within values in the group of dependent variables; F = significance test; Sig = significance level.
Table 19. Model Summary Table-Process Stress
N df Sig 386 14 .18 5.110 p < .001 a. Predictors: (Constant) ONE-DAY/ONE-TRIAL, AGE, GENDER, RACE, RELATIONSHIP STATUS, HIGH SCHOOL, COLLEGE, SELF-EMPLOYED/PT, FULL TIME, MARGINAL INCOME, CHILDREN, MANAGERIAL, PROFESSIONAL/TECHNICAL, SERVICE, DELIBERATIONS (HOURS), AND JURORS (# ON PANEL). b. Dependent Variable: PROCESS *N = sample size; df = degrees of freedom (# of cells less the number of restrictions or constraints placed on the model); Rz = test of variation or degrees of variation within values in the group of dependent variables; F = significance test; Sig - significance level.
Now that it is determined that the ovecalHnodel is significant, analysis
can turn to the interpretation of the coefficients. When interpreting the
coefficients, it is essential to keep in mind how variables are coded. The
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 44
dependent variable is coded with a range of 'O’ = not stressful to '20’ =
extremely stressful.
Table 20. Coefficient Table (Service) STANDARD FACTOR B T ERROR Constant 7.93 2.02 3.91*** ONE-DAY/ONE-TRIAL -1.11 .498 -2.24* AGE -.032 .022 .982 GENDER -.044 .496 -.090 RACE -.635 .603 -1.05 RELATIONSHIP STATUS -.355 .542 -.655 HIGH SCHOOL -2.55 .790 -3.24** COLLEGE -.849 .665 -1.27 SELF- 2.20 1.02 2.15* EMPLOYED/PART-TIME FULLTIME .985 .981 1.01 MARGINAL INCOME -2.23 .735 -3.03** CHILDREN .403 .222 1.81 MANAGERIAL -1.79 .745 -2.41* PROFESSIONAL/TECH -.189 .574 -.330 SERVICE 1.40 .838 1.67 DELIBERATIONS .032 .037 .865 JURORS .053 .091 .583 Dependent Variable: SERVICE, R2 = .15, F - 4.032, p < .001 (Two tail) *« p < .05, ** * p < .01, — - p< .001 (B = Beta, the value for the coefficient constant (7.93) which equals the mean value for the dependent variables if the value for all other factors set to 0; T represents the value of the coefficient by standard error and indicates whether the coefficient is significant ( 2.08 is significant)). Bold starred variables mark significant coefficients.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 45
Table 21. Coefficient Table (Process) STANDARD FACTOR B T ERROR Constant 2.78 2.25 1.23 ONE-DAY/ONE-TRIAL -.682 .554 -1.23 AGE -.04 .025 -1.76 GENDER -.206 .552 -.374 RACE -.408 .672 -.607 RELATIONSHIP STATUS -.356 .603 -.591 HIGH SCHOOL -1.57 .879 -1.78 COLLEGE -.338 .741 -.457 SELF- 1.31 1.14 EMPLOYED/PART-TIME 1.15 FULL TIME .653 1.09 .598 MARGINAL INCOME -.874 .818 -1.06 CHILDREN .012 .248 .049 MANAGERIAL -1.16 .830 -1.40 PROFESSIONAL/TECH .328 .639 -.406 SERVICE -3.78 .933 1.67 DELIBERATIONS .265 .041 6.44*“ JURORS .405 .101 4.00“ * Dependent Variable: PROCESS, R2 = .18, F * 5.11, p < .001 (Two tail) * * p < .05, ** = p < .01, — « p< .001 (B = Beta, the value for the coefficient constant (2.78) which equals the mean value for the dependent variables if the value for all other factors set to 0; T represents the value of the coefficient by standard error and indicates whether the coefficient is significant ( 2.08 is significant)). Bold starred variables mark significant coefficients.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 46
Interpretation of the Significant Independent Variables
The model secures empirical support for the research hypothesis that
one-day/one-trial jurors are subject to less service stress. The CONSTANT
value (which represents the level of stress that would be reported if the value
for all independent variables were 0) is 7.93. This is the level of SERVICE
stress felt by jurors not in one-day/one-trial jurisdictions. The average service
stress felt for one-day/one-trial jurors is 7.93 - 1.11 = 6.8232 which is
significantly less than that felt by jurors serving in non-one-day/one-trial
jurisdictions (Sig. = .001). This finding supports the major theoretical
argument of the current research. It is important to note that the remainder
of independent variables in the regression are "controlled for." That is to say,
the effect of the one-day/one-trial venue in reducing stress remains significant
even after controlling for gender, race, income, etc.
It is acceptable for these other possible sources of stress to have
significant effects on the dependent variable, but it would be problematic if
they rendered the main effect of one-day/one-trial insignificant. All other
independent variables will be interpreted in the findings section. The PROCESS
“ Please refer to the Coefficient Stress Table; note that the mean reduction of stress is 1.11 moving from non-one-day/one trial courts to one-day/one-trial courts. The constant va(ue(7.93) is the theoretical measure of stress if all other factors were set to zero for non-one- day/one-trial jurisdictions.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 47
model does not show significant reductions of stress when tested against the
set of variables in that model except for jury deliberations (in hours) (T = 6.44,
P < .001) and for jurors (number of jurors deciding a case) (T = 4.00, P < .001).
In closing, the significance of the overall model, in particular for the
SERVICE stressor model and of the one-day/one-trial variable, attests to the
stress reducing effect of employing a one-day/one-trial policy in courts.
Again, this conclusion is based upon the above findings and tests of
significance. This finding remains even with appropriate demographic controls
applied.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. CHAPTER III
LITERATURE REVIEW
The Importance of Juror Stress and Court Reform Research
Though a system of trial by jury has been used for over a thousand
years, it has only relatively recently received the attention of researchers,
policy-makers, court officials, ABA (Jury Standards Committee), the American
Board of Trial Advocates, the Jury Standards Task Force, and the general
public. Indeed, almost 50 years of jury-related research has now passed. The
overarching concern for many who have studied the institution is whether the
system still works as originally intended. In addressing that concern, the
American jury system has been studied from a variety of broad-spectrum and
specific subject matter themes and topics including jury reform, jury
competence, jury nullification, jury profiling, jury decision-making, jury
administration, jury roles, and jury pools, to name a few.
One area of jury research that has not been thoroughly researched is
juror stress. The purpose of my dissertation is to build upon the research that
was developed by the NCSC. Using NCSC data that identified sources of juror
48
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. stress, I have tested the significance that juror certainty of service has (serving
in a jurisdiction that employs a one-day/one-trial policy against the
uncertainty that jurors face when serving in non-one-day /one-trial
jurisdictions) and will explore further sources of potential juror stress. In
structuring cross-tabulations of known jury stress factors with jurors assigned
to one-day/one-trial jurisdictions and jurors assigned to non-one-day/one-trial
jurisdictions, I hope to further refine an understanding of the concept of juror
stress, especially as it would help to identify whether one-day/one-trial
policies have a significant impact upon juror stress.
Why is the study of juror stress important? Why is it important to know
more about juror demographics as possible influences upon juror stress? What
studies have previously focused upon juror stress and one-day/one-trial
policies?
A 1995 Gallup Poll showed that public interest in serving on juries had
dropped more than 50 percent since the 0 . J. Simpson trial had begun
(Curriden 1995, 72). Citizen desire to participate in jury duty is at an all time
low.
Myers and Griller provide an interesting analogy that depicts juror
service in the framework of a college course. It serves to convey the degree of
difficulty that one might experience as a juror, especially in the sense that
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 50
note taking would not be allowed. (Arizona jurors now are allowed to take
notes during certain trials).
Assume that you have gone back to school, enrolled in a required course, and that I am one of your instructors. The course will probably take between 6 and 12 days, but may go on for weeks, months, or even years. You will know nothing about the subject matter of the course, which will be taught by between 15 and 30 instructors.
During the time you take this course, you will be away from your family and friends. You will also miss work, and although your employer may not pay you, we will give you twelve dollars per day, except for the first day. However, we will pay for your mileage or a bus pass on that day.
Each of your instructors w ill be experts in their fields. However, you may neither take notes, nor ask questions of any of the instructors, no matter how confusing you may find their lectures. We may permit you to briefly see some of the course material, although you will not be given copies. I will not explain the rules of the course or the final exam until all of the instructors have completed their lectures.
During the course, people may try to speak to you; urge you to violate these rules; invade your privacy; intimidate you; or even threaten you life. You may not, under any circumstances, speak with anyone about the course, the instructors, the course materials, or the lectures-not even your fellow students. And although you may be confined in a little room with some of your fellow students, you still may not speak with them.
You must accurately recall the information that you hear, for the final examination. You must remember everything that is said-except when I tell you not to remember it. During the final exam, you may discuss the course content with your fellow students, but you may not ask any questions.
The exam will comprise only one or two questions, but all 12 of you must agree upon the answer, which must be precise. A person’s life, freedom, or property will depend upon your answer. Lawyers may ask you to sign affidavits to change your exam answers, or your answers may ultimately
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 51
be invalidated. If so, the courts will have no effect on the person whose life, freedom, or property hangs in the balance.
If you violate any of these rules during the course, I may assess a fine against you or lock you up.
Now, who among you would like to sign up for this course?
(Myers and Griller 1977,13)
In this chapter, I will highlight several areas of reform that have taken
place to the modern American jury system. Though juror stress has not
ostensibly been a factor that has guided thought in the jury reform movement,
juror hardships have and obviously, some reforms have served to improve the
process of jury service. Several topical areas will be reviewed in this chapter
including the tradition of the jury system, jury competence/demographics/
characteristics/representativeness, summoning procedures, stressful trials, and
jury sequestration. Many references to current literature will be cited.
Though few studies have been performed that directly focus on the
topic of juror stress, much research and thought has been devoted to the field
of jury reform including special interest areas such as educating the public
about jury service, broadening the scope of the jury pool, accommodations of
jurors in the courthouse, improving jury selection procedures, providing jurors
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. with tools to make better decisions, and enhancing the effectiveness of jury
deliberations.33
For many, it is within the kernel of jury reform that the issue of juror
stress can be distinguished. Juror stress can be described as an unusual
environmental condition that causes physiological, emotional, behavioral, or
cognitive changes in an individual. It is impossible to describe what stress
ultimately means to each individual. Psychological definitions of stress
describe it as a physical or emotional reaction to a situation perceived as
unfamiliar, threatening, harmful, and so on. It is difficult then to define stress
as an exact or precisely related term. The juror, for example, who is
self-employed and as a result would be forced to forgo income during the term
of juror service would unquestionably experience some expressed level of
stress/hardship/psychological anxiety. In this example, the broad term of
juror stress could probably be more accurately described as economic stress.
Each of the tested variables in this study should, in follow-up research,
inevitably focus on more precise definitions of juror stress, however it is
important to maintain that juror stress (as measured by statistical significances
of each tested variable) can be measured. It is up to policymakers to interpret
“ See Council for Court Excellence District of Columbia Jury Project, Juries for the Year 2000 and Bevond: Proposals to Improve the Jury Systems in Washington. D.C.. February 1998.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. the specific relationships to stress variables so that modifications to jury
administration policy can be explored. This is the real purpose and ambition
for this study. The concept of juror stress and the associated links to its
endurance should cause policymakers to question aspects of jury management,
and several changes have been made to the jury system over that last decade
in the area of jury reform. Though many jury reform measures have been
considered by state legislatures (increasing juror pay, allowing people to
volunteer for jury service, etc.), there are many who believe that the basic
jury system model is obsolete.
Aside from charges that the American adversarial decision-making
process is administratively outmoded, "there are those, including former Chief
Justice Burger, who advocate the further restriction of jury usage and rest
their case on the grounds that the institution is costly, inefficient, and
unpredictable” (Heyderbrand and Seron 1990,106). Jury reform, as
understood by many members of the public, is founded in the belief, in part,
that the system is "running amok and believe that juries are exonerating the
guilty on the strength of abuse excuse defenses or are awarding millions of
dollars to plaintiffs with trivial claims” (Curriden 1995, 73).
Despite the call that juries have become irrational, dysfunctional, and
potentially outmoded, the jury system remains a fundamental, deeply steeped
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 54
American tradition of legal right. Indeed, the Sixth Amendment of the
Constitution provides for the right to an impartial jury at least in terms of its
federal application. After its passage, individual states regulated the concept
of juries for its citizens according to each states’ laws. The Sixth Amendment
states: "In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a
speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein
the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously
ascertained by law” (U.S. Constitution, Amendment VI).
In 1886, the Fourteenth Amendment prohibited states from making or
enforcing any law "which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens
of the United States” or from depriving "any person of life, liberty or property,
without due process of law,” or from denying "to any person within its
jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws” (U.S. Constitution, Amendment
XIV). In 1968, the Duncan v. Louisiana ruling integrated the Sixth Amendment
right to an impartial jury into the Fourteenth Amendment thereby making the
Sixth Amendment applicable to the states through the Fourteenth
Amendment.34
^Duncan v. Louisiana, 391 U.S. 145 (1968).
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. To sum up, trial by jury, as an American institution, is not likely to be
erased from jurisprudential procedure any time soon.35 There is, however,
much widespread dissatisfaction with the system and it is clearly in a period of
transition. Jury reform is not a new concept, though recently, the
concentrated effort of court planners, legislatures, policy-making bodies, the
ABA, and sociologists have catapulted jury reform to the main stage spotlight.
Dissatisfaction with the system has caused a barrage of activity to focus on
ways to address jury service and process issues. In reviewing the literature,
several foundational works can be identified which reflect debates in political
philosophy and law. In the works highlighted below, authors generally discuss
whether there should be juries and if so, what juries should do. Most appear
to favor the jury as an institution that should be based on "systematic
scientific inquiry” (Hans and Vidmar 1986,19).
Sociologists in the 1950’s and 1960’s became concerned with the role
and capacity of juries to perform competently. The Chicago Jury Project
“ in her book, The Jury: Its Role in American Society. Rita J. Simon writes, "In the 1950's the jury was under attack as an outmoded institution that needed replacement. Shortly before, in Great Britain, the jury had been retained for criminal trials, but was no longer used for civil actions. A movement led and supported by members of the appellate bench urged the United States to follow the British example. The in itia l research output of the Chicago Jury Project was examined with an eye for evidence supporting the arguments of those who favored doing away with the jury, at least in civil actions. But detractors of the jury found little in the early publications to strengthen their arguments” (P. xii).
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 56
generated numerous studies of the American jury and in 1966,36 publication of
Harry Kalven Jr. and Hans Zeisel’s The American Jury produced the first
systematic study of the jury decision-making process. Kalven and Zeisel’s
argument centered on how the jury actually performs and the thrust of their
analysis seems to have focused upon the notion that judges and juries disagree
on the assumptions of fact and that decisions of the jury sometimes differ from
those that would be given by the judge in the same case. At the heart of
Kalven and Zeisel's argument was a concern over juror competence.
In the wake of controversy following the Kalven and Zeisel study, Rita
J. Simon in The Jury: Its Role in American Society shifted attention from jury
competence to juror representativeness and to its deliberative process (1980).
Simon asserts, "the purpose.. .has not been to claim that the jury is beyond
reproach or incapable of error. My aim has simply been to show how an
institution run by amateurs, directed and organized by ordinary people, using
their common sense, and following formal rules can perform its duty in a
consistently responsible manner; how it can stand above popular prejudice and
deliver verdicts that experts steeped and trained in the law respect” (Simon
1980,147).
“ Latest reprinting in 1986.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 57
In Hastie, Penrod, and Pennington's Inside the Jury, the authors
present the findings of a mock jury study (1983). The study focused on the
effect of the decision rule and the juror’s behavior during deliberation and the
% influence of jury background demographics on juror decision-making. The
authors state: "Individual differences in background, including demographic
characteristics, attitudes, and personality factors, are related to behavior as a
juror. Demographic factors, such as age, social class, and gender, and role,
such as jury foreman, have effects on verdict preferences, performance during
deliberation, and post-deliberation ratings, including ratings of each juror by
others” (Hastie, Penrod, and Pennington 1983,121). For those concerned with
systematic jury selection, the mock jury study conducted by Hastie et al. was
of great interest. The authors reveal that social science does not provide
evidence that scientific methods alone can predict juror bias but attitudes,
particularly case-relevant attitudes "such as toward the death penalty or rape,
appear to be the most powerful individual difference predictors of verdict
preference that have been studied to date” (Hastie et al. 1983, 128).37 Of the
37ln the Hastie et al. study, 828 jurors provided information on their personal backgrounds in a post-deliberation questionnaire, including age, gender, occupation residence, education, political party, ideology, m arital status, income, race, number of previous cases heard as a juror, and number of previous criminal cases heard as a juror. That information was entered into a step-wise multiple regression, with variables such as occupation and residence included to reflect socioeconomic status, and using pre-deliberation verdict preference as the dependent variable, assuming equal interval values ranging from one for first degree murder to four for self-defense. The deliberation process data were analyzed from questionnaires that were completed immediately before the start of deliberation.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 58
many demographic variables tested, only four variables produced significant
F’s including employed versus non-employed/retired (r = .119), gender (r =
*.073), number of previous criminal cases as jurors (r = -.059) and number of
previous cases (criminal or civil) as jurors (r = .054). The F test in Haste’s
study was used to calculate an answer to the question of whether the means
from the three decision rule treatment groups were reliably different; the
larger the F-statistic, the more likely that the three means tested were
reliably different. (The significance level associated with the main effect of
decision rule is F (1.63) = 6.56, p < .003 which is beyond the p < .01 threshold
and established this empirical difference as reliable.) The r scores in Haste’s
study presumably indicate the two-tailed test for correlation of the variables
where 1 is the base. None of the other variables tested added as much as 1
percent to R. None of the attitudinal or demographic measures that served as
criteria in the analysis yielded more than a 20 percent correlation with the
juror’s verdict preferences. Haste et al. conclude that even though predictive
information is weak in the voir dire stage, significant returns may be achieved
using scientific methods. Haste’s use of demographic variables to test juror
decision-making outcomes establishes that social science statistical
correlations can be successfully used in juror studies.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 59
Jury demographics are also discussed in the work of Kassin and
Wrightsman in The American Jury on Trial (1988). Kassin and Wrightsman
regard jurors as distinguishable by basic census categories-race, sex, age,
religion, socioeconomic status, education and other basic demographic
categories. The authors argue that courts prescribe juror diversity in an
existing population:
this objective is based on the belief that demographic heterogeneity increases both the appearance and the reality of justice . . . people, including judges and lawyers, believe that verdicts are predictable from the sociological composition of the jury. (Kassin and Wrightsman 1988, 29)
I would hasten to add that courts, in actuality, have little control over
"prescribing” jury composition.
The authors conclude that clear relationships between individual juror
characteristics and decision-making are unproved by social researchers or that
when relationships in the data are statistically significant, that the conclusions
are "volatile” at least in the sense that individual field studies cannot establish
reliable findings. I suspect that Kassin and Wrightsman would agree that
multi-site studies and larger study populations would help to increase the
generalizeability of findings. In closing this discussion, the authors
interestingly refer to an example, where, in a study conducted by Rita Simon,
subjects listened to a recorded simulation of a criminal trial that involved
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. either a breaking-and-entering or incest charge and in both cases, the
defendant pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity (1967). Compared with
their male counterparts, Simon found that female jurors were more lenient
toward the housebreaking defendant, but more harsh toward the incest case
defendant. In the spirit of substantiating their conclusion, Kassin and
Wrightsman add that the interaction found in Simon’s study "is more the rule
than the exception in the relationship between juror demographics and
verdicts” (Stephan 1967, 98).
Let us now move into a discussion of jury reform. Improving the juror
experience continues to remain an important challenge to state courts. Courts
have recognized that management of jury service can have considerable
impact upon how the public perceives the justice system. What relevance
does the issue of juror stress share with the jury reform movement? Only
relatively recently has the issue concerning juror stress appeared as a concern
in justice administration literature. The phenomenon labeled as juror stress,
at least in my estimation, represents an awakening of thought on behalf of
courts and judicial researchers that is aimed at providing an additional layer of
insight into reasoned clarification of the source and solution to increasingly
high levels of juror dissatisfaction.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 61 Until relatively recently, court reformers have relied predominantly on
studies that have, to varying degrees of success, accomplished an
identification of general factors associated with jurors' dissatisfaction with
their term of service. It is difficult to know or test whether, in general, juror
stress is a cause or an effect of juror dissatisfaction-in the end, the two
concepts may not be all that decipherable. What is important to understand
and appreciate is that some differences are obvious. Receiving a jury
summons may produce a certain level of stress for its recipient; however, it
would be unreasonable to argue that the same summons would perfunctorily
generate dissatisfaction. Jury reform measures have served to address a
reduction of known levels of juror dissatisfaction, but it is also important to
know what factors, if any, lay beneath the issue of disappointment with the
jury system. So, in formulating strategies to combat juror dissatisfaction-the
focus of the jury reform movement, one could appreciate an additional layer
of clarification-from the perspective of understanding stress-related concerns
of jurors. Whether contemplating jury reform policies that address research
conclusions based upon the element of juror dissatisfaction or juror stress, the
output is the same-that is, when possible, policymakers should be compelled
to shape strategies which are aimed at successfully improving the jury
experience and in improving citizen participation in jury service. An
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. examination of current jury reform measures is important since it is
anticipated that particular study stress variables are expected to be identified
and subsequently linked to suggested amendments to jury administration
procedures. The following section merely identifies some of the reforms to
jury administration that have already been suggested or implemented in
courts. Various reform measures may correspond directly with the issue of
juror stress-child care (number of children living at home), summons
procedure (service stress), time spent waiting (waste of time), and improving
juror compensation (job type). Other highlighted juror reforms will serve to
inform the reader of improvements that have been implemented by courts that
have addressed specific problematic issues of juror dissatisfaction.
Citizen participation and apathy, as well as inaccurate juror source
lists also serve as primary factors causing low juror yield. Policy-makers have
begun to address the problem by implementing reforms that serve to assist
jurors to reach better decisions and provide more respect for jurors who do
answer the call. Many of the reforms have concentrated on improving
summons procedures to increase the jury pool, but several reform efforts have
also led to increasing courtesies to prospective jurors. Many courts now
customarily explain the reasons to prospective jurors for long delays, provide
phone accessibility, and provide comfortable seating in the jury lounge.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 63
Longer-term goals have also been considered which include
accommodating physically and sensory disabled jurors, providing nursing and
child care services at the courthouse, and creating facilities for jurors to use
computers in quiet workstations. Many courts have proposed or have
implemented policies which allow jurors to ask witnesses questions,38 and in
Arizona, a state considered at the forefront in jury reform, a proposed Bill of
Rights for Jurors has been proposed which would include the following
pronouncements:
Judges, attorneys, and court staff shall make every effort to assure that Arizona jurors are:
• Treated with courtesy and respect and with regard for their privacy.
• Randomly selected for jury service, fre§ from discrimination on the basis of race, ethnicity, gender, age, religion, economic status or physical disability.
• Provided with comfortable and convenient facilities, with special attention to the needs of jurors with physical disabilities.
• Informed of trial schedules that are then kept.
• Informed of the trial process and of the applicable law in plain and clear language.
“ Some states such as Arizona have been leaders in the jury reform movement. Arizona courts, for instance, have allowed greater jury participation through changes in Rules of Civil Procedure, which have allowed jurors the ability to actively participate in the fact-finding process. Arizona jurors are also allowed to take notes and to ask certain questions, which enable them to better understand the evidence and legal instructions.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 64
• Able to take notes during trial and to ask questions of witnesses or the judge and to have them answered as permitted by law.
• Told of the circumstances under which they may discuss the evidence during the trial among themselves in the jury room, while all are present, as long as they keep an open mind on guilt or innocence or who should win.
• Entitled to have questions and requests that arise or are made during deliberations as fully answered and met as allowed by law.
• Offered appropriate assistance from the court when they experience serious anxieties or stress, or any trauma, as a result of jury service.
• Able to express concerns, complaints, and recommendations to courthouse authorities.
• Fairly compensated for jury service.
(Myers and Gn'ller 1997,17)
Jury reform programs, like those in New York State, typically
concentrate on three major objectives: increasing the representativeness of
jury pools so that they are representative of the community they serve,
providing a jury system that operates efficiently and effectively, and offering a
jury service experience that is positive for the citizens who are summoned to
serve. The survey questions asked of jurors in the National Center for State
Court Jury Study characteristically focused upon these fundamental jury
reform concerns.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 65
Out of about 15 million people who annually receive summonses for
jury duty, only 1.5 million of that pool actually serves and the no-show rate
tops 60 percent (Myers and Griller 1997, 73). In King County, Washington, the
response rate is only 15% according to Michael Planet, former Court
Administrator (Sowa 1999, 6). While factors such as low pay, job and family
responsibility, and other hardships influence citizens’ willingness to serve,
other factors including mental health concerns are beginning to surface.
"Juror stress is not only a source of suffering and disability, but also a
potential threat to our jury system" says Thomas Hafemeister, a lawyer and
psychologist formerly with the National Center for State Courts (St. Louis
Post-Dispatch 1995,1A). With that in mind, many court officials are troubled
by juror stress as yet another source of suffering and disability-a realization
that further exacerbates the publics’ tendency to avoid jury service.
Not only does the concept of potential stress have an effect upon jury
summons response rates, but once impaneled, jury duty proceedings-initial
contact with the system, voir dire, trial deliberations, and post-trial
proceedings-all have considerable and consequential impact upon the
individual juror. With an unexpected arrival of a jury summons, an array of
stress factors can often begin before the actual commencement of a trial, but
once an individual reports to the court, nervous tension and anxiety often
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. intensifies over confusion and waiting to be called for a jury panel. In a study
conducted in 1998 by the Washington State’s Jury Commission, jurors most
frequently complained about the excessive time spent doing nothing and that
jury service lasted too long and interfered with work-though interestingly, low
compensation for jury duty was not found to be a primary problem (St. Louis
Post-Dispatch 1995, 6). In Florida, jurors are required to serve one day or one
trial, after which they are excused, and many other states have also
implemented the one-day/one-trial rule (Floyd 1999, 8).
In a study conducted by Theodore Feldmann of the University of
Louisville School of Medicine, jury duty was associated with a variety of
psychosocial stressors that may have adverse effects on mental health
(Feldmann 1999). Variables such as length of the trial, public profile and
media coverage, sequestration of the jury, graphic evidence, complicated or
technical testimony, difficult deliberations, complicated legal strategies,
violent crimes against children, acts of gross negligence, and insanity issues
were explored. Dr. Feldmann also alleges that jury stress may also influence
deliberations and helps to lead juries to deliberate based upon emotional
reactions rather than on the strength of the trial evidence. Not surprisingly,
Dr. Feldmann’s study found that juror stress is often associated with
high-profile murder trials in which graphic and disturbing evidence is
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 67
presented. In especially brutal crimes, exposed jurors frequently experience
stress-particularly in cases involving children. Feldmann’s study also
indicated that juror stress appears to be elevated in civil cases of wrongful
death or personal injury. Regardless of the case type, when elements of
visually disturbing evidence and intense media and community scrutiny of the
proceedings converge, jurors tend to be stressed.
In studies aimed at determining which factors influence juror
decision-making, a variety of researchers found that exposure to pretrial
publicity may skew jury decisions against the defense. Pretrial publicity can
affect decision-making even when the juror is exposed to the publicity a long
time before the trial according to Steven Penrod, JD, PhD, professor of law at
the University of Minnesota (DeAngelis 1995). In other bodies of research,
jurors were found to be more influenced by social influence or by persuasion
by fellow jurors. Penrod and other have found that outright persuasion may
have minimal effect, but that jurors do tend to surrender their decision if they
feel overwhelmed by the rest of the jury. This type of psychological pressure
may also be stressful to jurors.
Though not directly related to the issue of stress, researchers have
explored the question of race and whether there are decision-making biases
that are different between blacks and whites. According to Nancy King,
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 6 8
associate law professor at Vanderbilt University, as summarized in a 1993
article in the Michigan Law Review, many studies reveal that white jurors are
more likely than black jurors to convict black defendants and that whites are
also more likely to acquit defendants charged with crimes against black victims
(DeAngelis 1995). King also noted that black jurors tend to show bias in the
other direction in that they are more likely than whites to convict defendants
of either race who are accused of assaulting a black victim and that blacks are
also less likely to convict black defendants. Jurors accused of race-based
decisions face the possibility of post-trial* stress as high profile cases receive
public attention through the media.
In the collection of studies that have researched some form of jury
stress, trial-related factors such as violence or gore, heightened publicity or
racial tension can have effects upon jurors. These stressors often have real
consequences that include depression, anxiety, weight loss, sleep loss, and
disruptions in close relationships and in general life functions. Some studies
have shown that jurors that have been exposed to acutely graphic testimony
may react similarly, though not as vigorously, as the victims of the crimes.
"Juror stress is not only a source of suffering and disability, but also a
potential threat to our jury system," says Thomas Hafemeister, a lawyer and
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 69
psychologist [formerly] with the National Center for State Courts, a non-profit
organization in Williamsburg, VA (Roan 1995).
James Levine, director of the doctoral program in criminal justice at
John Jay College in New York states that ultra-high stress levels could make it
difficult for juries to reach fair verdicts and that "We should care about jury
stress because there are some hints that there might be negative repercussions
in the decision process. There is the thought that juries might retaliate
perhaps subconsciously and? take out their own stress on the defendant or the
prosecutor. The other problem is that jurors (under stress) might capitulate
just to end the whole thing" (Roan 1995, 58).
Juror stress has caused jurors to actually file suit against courts for
defamation and emotional stress that have resulted after unusually stressful
trials. In a suit filed against King County (Seattle, WA), a woman serving as
one of 12 jurors in a trial of a man accused of masterminding the killing of a
family in January 1997 claimed the deputy prosecutor defamed her and
damaged her reputation by publicly claiming that the juror "sabotaged" the
case by holding out on a guilty verdict. The juror claimed that as a result of
the statements made by the deputy prosecutor, she had received harassing
telephone calls from the public (Solomon 1999).
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. I
70
Psychological effects of jury duty can cause certain jurors to want to
avoid further involvement in the jury duty process. In a case of a Tampa juror
serving on a child molestation case, the juror became so distraught over the
details of the trial that she eventually flung herself against a patch of poison
ivy, and then eagerly waited for a rash to develop. Once she began to
experience a red, blistery, and itchy rash, she asked to be excused. The
condition was not serious enough medically to warrant dismissal from service,
and she claimed that the judge told her that "Only death or hospitalization
would yet you out of this” (Davidowitz 1994, 82).
Of the ten million Americans who will be asked to serve on juries this
year, about 52% of them will be women and "The potential for emotional
trauma during a trial is extremely high,” says Judy McCorkindale, a mental
health professional who has counseled jurors for the Pierce County Superior
Court System in Tacoma, WA (Davidowitz 1994,' 80). Gruesome criminal trials,
highly publicized cases and even civil cases can be traumatic, especially if they
are lengthy, involve large sums of money or involve someone’s professional
reputation. Experts claim that women jurors are more likely to experience
stress than their male counterparts according to Dr. Roger Bell, a professor of
psychiatry at the University of Louisville in Kentucky: "Woman are more in
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. touch and less apt to deny feelings.. .[and] are more likely to identify with
the victim” (Davidowitz 1994, 83).
The research clearly exposes the fact that jurors do experience stress
as a result of their service, though most jurors do not require further
intervention. J. Chris Nordgren, an adjunct assistant professor of psychology
at the University of South Dakota and a clinical psychologist at West River
Psychological Services, Rapid City, SD, has developed what he termed ttie
Graduated Jury Stress Management (GJSM) protocol. The system developed by
Nordgren identifies a specific level of intervention to match the intensity of
jury or juror. Stress intervention is then provided in appropriate proportion to
the intensity of the jurors’ stress responses (Nordgren and Thelen 1999).
Nordgren’s GJSM protocol is divided into five levels, from the lowest to the
highest levels of intervention: 1) Written materials, 2) Judicial discharge
instructions, 3) Flexible defusing of juries, 4) Jury stress debriefing, and 5)
Individual therapy. Under Nordgren’s system, the court is responsible for
determining which level to implement for the first three levels of intervention,
and a mental health professional is responsible for determining the final two.
Though jury sequestration is rare, usually because it is so expensive for
the court system and so unnaturally onerous for the jurors, sequestration can
be a major source of stress for many jurors. Sequestration is used for the most
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 72
highly publicized cases where jurors may not be able to avoid exposure to
prejudicial information. Sequestration is used when juror safety may be an
issue or in the case of New York State,19 when jurors are deliberating criminal
cases. Most courts make it a point to accommodate sequestered jurors and
attempt to make their experience as comfortable as possible under the
circumstances. Many people, however, abstain from serving on a sequestered
jury and obtaining a wide cross section of jurors is sometimes a problem for
many courts.
Jury sequestration refers to the physical isolation of the jury from the
rest of society and can take place at two points in the judicial process: 1)
during the trial itself and 2) during deliberations. During sequestration, jurors
are forbidden to have significant contact with anyone except fellow jurors,
they must be confined to the courtroom or the jury room during working hours,
and they must sleep and eat in special quarters. For sequestered jurors, sex is
normally off-limits and physical activity is strictly limited. Court officers
monitor every move, often following jurors into bathrooms, and jurors can be
held in contempt of court and are subject to fines and imprisonment should
39New York State changed its law in June of 1995 whereby the judge now has the discretion to keep the jury apart from the community during the entire trial or during deliberation. However, even now sequestration is mandatory in casfeof serious felonies.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 73
they stray from court-imposed restrictions. Sequestered jurors are often
referred to as "prisoners of the court.”
Community opinion can also add to the stress levels experienced by
sequestered jurors. "Where the defendant is the subject of public scorn there
can be pressures to convict.. .frightful cases entailing violence often create
public fervor for convictions that can result in a rush to judgment” (Levine
1996, 268).
From the point of view of a presiding judge with more than 25 years on
the bench, his post-trial chats with more than 5,000 jurors over 14 years have t, revealed that most jurors find jury service a stressful experience (Halbert
1998, 9). The unnamed judge cited in the article believes that jury service is
second only to serving in the armed forces, as far as duty of citizenship is
concerned, and feels that jurors should be honored for their service, especially
those who respond to jury subpoenas.
The judge points out that jury service is involuntary, in the sense that
jurors are ordered to appear and resultantly sometimes receive no
compensation for their efforts. In order to minimize the initial
apprehensiveness of jurors, the judge recommends that the jury selection (voir
dire) should not be turned over to a court officer. The judge prefers to greet
the jurors and to offer some light words of welcome. The purpose of the
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 74
initial dialogue is to inform the jurors about issues concerning compensation,
dress, guestimates of the length of the trial, and starting and ending
times-including lunch breaks—presumably methods designed to relieve juror
stress.
Along with the court officer, the judge personally knocks on the door
of the jury deliberation room on the day of trial, and every morning, the judge
leads the jury into the courtroom. In an effort to respect the time of the
jurors, and his initial promise to the jurors that a 9 to 5 schedule will be
enforced, the judge will not hesitate to cut off direct or cross-examination in
mid-sentence, if need be, in order to excuse the jury for the evening. The
judge does not believe in sending the jurors back to the deliberation room
each time the attorneys allege that they must place something on the record.
This technique, he claims, saves valuable court time.
To accommodate the trial attorneys, the judge advises counsel that
they can briefly side bar anytime they want though chambers discussions are
never allowed. The judge almost always resists overnight sequestration,
except in cases where an exculpatory statement or some highly prejudicial
evidence has been suppressed during a criminal trial. In appropriate cases, the
judge allows the jurors to take notes in order to make it easier for jurors to
keep track of the evidence that may be offered in multiple plaintiff and
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 75
defendant trials. The judge frequently permits jurors to question the
witnesses, although he limits the practice to the questioning of medical or
other technical experts.
In instances where it appears that a hung jury is a strong possibility,
the judge instructs the jurors to return to the deliberation room and to make a
list of the key issues that divide them. The list of disagreements is then show
to the trial attorneys and, following a brief recess, each attorney is given 10
minutes to respond to the list by making oral arguments to the jury.
Perhaps most unique is the practice of this judge to clear the
courtroom of everyone except for the jurors and all counsel following the
announcement of the verdict. The judge then conducts and supervises a
wide-ranging critique of the lawyers by the jury in terms of how counsel
conducted the trial. The jurors are also encouraged to criticize the judge's
performance as well. The follow up, including a personal assessment of each
attorney by the jury, helps to bring closure to the jury. No notes of testimony
are taken. The judge maintains that the practices described help to enhance
the treatment of jurors. His hope is that juror response rates will
consequently improve.
In addition to the many other reasons why jurors often experience
stress, jurors deliberating in hung jury trials are particularly prone to negative
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 76
experiences. While many jurors in deadlocked trials consider the fact that
they were not successful in rendering a verdict and feel a certain amount of
guilt as a result, many of these jurors also have difficulty slipping back into
their normal lives after the trial has ended.
The trial by an impartial jury has remained the cornerstone of the U.S.
judicial system from its beginning, but only recently have researchers begun to
examine the toll that the tasks of this important civic responsibility can take
on the average citizens. In one of the few studies investigating the juror stress
phenomenon, researchers from the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine
in 1992 polled 40 jurors from two murder cases. The cases involved a
child-abuse and pornography. The researchers found that 27 jurors had
physical or psychological stress symptoms, including some of the same stress
responses as the actual victims (excluding of course the murdered victims),
although not with as much intensity (Wasserman 1994, 6). Of those jurors
responding positively to stress, symptoms included sleeplessness, nightmares,
stomach distress, nervousness, headaches, heart palpitations and depression.
In many national cases, jury panels have undergone post-trial "stress
debriefing” with social workers and psychologists in an effort to work through
unsettling experiences, but overall, this type of counseling has been limited to
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 77
the more notorious of cases. Jurors serving on the Jeffrey Dahmer trial,40 a
trial that attracted much media attention, received such a debriefing.
Pressure to reach a verdict can put unprecedented stress on jurors of
high-profile cases. As in the case against Oklahoma bombing conspirator Terry
Nichols, jurors found themselves second-guessed, harassed and even
threatened because they come to an unpopular decision (Lloyd 1998,1). That
jury had to deal with verbal attacks against the jury’s widely criticized
decision regarding the defendant’s death penalty. After the jury deadlocked,
the jury was dismissed which left the sentencing in the hands of US District
Court Judge Richard Matsch. One juror on that trial reportedly received a
series of bomb threats at her home from an anonymous caller (Lloyd1998,1).
In a press report that focused on people and policies shaping Los
Angeles County, contributors to the report cited jury duty as an adventure-or
an endurance test. "The ambience can run the gamut from ocean views to
basements that boast linoleum" (O’Neill et al. 1998, B-2). The reporters
surveyed some of the Los Angeles county courthouses from the perspective of
the juror and described the conditions that jurors often face as they are called
to serve.
^Dahmer confessed to the dismemberment and slayings of 17 in Milwaukee, Wl, in 1993.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 78
In Los Angeles, over 4 million names are culled from a master list,
which produce about 173,000 jurors. Of the 4 million, 1.2 million people
didn’t qualify for jury service for reasons that ranged from not speaking English
to being in jail and an additional 800,000 people claimed undue hardship.
Hardships were claimed in the cases of the self-employed and for people whose
companies would not pay them for their days off for jury service. Specifically,
840,000 were excused for financial hardship and 238,000 were excused for
medical reasons.
✓* The courts draw upon the rolls of registered voters and from the motor
vehicle lists. Though many feel that the same 170,000 are called year after
year, the jury services manager assures its Lost Angeles citizenry that the list is
created each year anew. Where a particular potential juror lives will dictate
what courthouse that person will serve in. Smaller courthouses, in general,
entertain fewer trials and often place jurors on call. The on-call jurors must
phone the court each day to find out whether they must report the next
morning. In larger high-volume courthouses, jury commissioners often depend
upon large body counts.
In a study of the Washington D.C. courts entitled Juries for the Year
2000 and Bevond: Proposals to Improve the Jury System in Washington. D. C..
the Council for Court Excellence, a judicial oversight group, set forth 32
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 79
recommendations. The recommendations ranged from the pragmatic to the
revisionary and have implications and applicability far beyond the uniqueness
of the D.C. court structures and jury pool problems.41 The Council’s report
supports the ABA’s position in favor of jury note taking and witness questioning
and takes notice of other issues surrounding peremptory challenges and
pre-deliberative juror discussion. As with the courts of Los Angeles, and many
others of the nation’s large metropolitan court systems, the report identifies a
large percentage of jurors who choose to ignore jury duty. The report claims
that 20 percent of the city’s residents fail to appear for duty when summoned,
and an additional 43 percent never receive the jury summons in the first place.
The study also revealed that over one quarter of the citizens who are
summoned are actually qualified and appear for jury service in the D.C.
Superior Court or the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.42
The report cites citizen apathy and inaccurate juror lists as the
primary factors causing low juror yield. The recommendations that followed
from the report were assembled from a group of judges, lawyers,
academicians, and former jurors who shared an interest in enhancing jury
41Coundl for Court Excellence. 1996 "Juries for the Year 2000 and Beyond: Proposals to Improve the Jury System in Washington, D.C.," Washington, D.C., September.
42Council for Court Excellence. 1996. "Juries for the Year 2000 and Beyond: Proposals to Improve the Jury System in Washington, D.C.”, Washington, D.C., September, pp. 70.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 80
service in D.C.’s local and federal courts. The report's recommendations
clearly embrace at least three different themes including 1) more respect for
jurors who answer the call; 2) more tools to help jurors reach better decisions;
and 3) improved summons procedures to increase the jury pools and draw more
people into the process. The report highlighted the importance of simple
courtesies such as explaining prolonged delays to jurors, phone accessibility,
and comfortable seating in the jury lounge. Longer term goals such as
accommodations for the physically and sensory disabled, nursing and child care
services at the courthouse, and workstations in quiet room to facilitate
computer usage were also mentioned.
Other quality of life issues, as they pertain to jury service
enhancements, included recognizing the importance of the work of jurors. For
instance, the report recommended that jurors be permitted to use and
maintain exhibit notebooks during trial and jury deliberations and that jurors
be advised that they may take notes during trial. Following the benchmarks
implemented in Maricopa County, AZ, the study also recommended that jurors
be allowed to submit written questions to be asked of witnesses by the trial
judge.
Though the Council for Court Excellence report did not focus on the
issue of juror stress, long-term goals such as court facilitated childcare for
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. jurors was mentioned. One of the test variables in this study (number of
children living at home), may have relevance to courts that are planning or
who intend to provide childcare facilities for its jurors. Should it be revealed,
for instance, that jurors with greater numbers of children living at home
experience greater measures of stress, judicial policymakers could find such
outcomes helpful in defense of proposing court-sponsored childcare services.
Similarly, the Council for Court Excellence study recommended improved
summons procedures to increase the jury pools and draw more people into the
process. In preliminary analyses, the reporting for jury service variable also
tested for significant association with juror stress. Courts realizing that this
could look toward intervention strategies that could be designed to reduce the
threat of juror service. At the least courts, could consider implementation of
one-day/one-trial policies and notifications thereof that would be included on
the juror summons thereby reducing anxiety associated with a person’s not
knowing how long he or she might be called to serve. Court officials compelled
to rely upon controlled study data would likely find several statistical measures
within this study that could be used to convince judicial policymakers to move
forward in discussing specific guidelines or techniques aimed at reducing juror
stress.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 82
The Jury and Social Justice
Among the recognized advantages of jury participation is that it
provides an important civic experience for citizens (Kalven and Zeisel 1986;
Simson 1980). The original Constitution, however, did not contain a provision
for guaranteeing trial jury in civil disputes.43 The anti-federalist movement to
secure a criminal [but not civil] jury trial right by constitutional amendment
was built on the belief that jury deliberation would effectuate a result
different from that likely to be obtained even by an honest judge sitting
without a jury (Wolfram 1973). Kalven and Zeisel did not provide a great deal
of explanation for their conclusions about the distinguishing quality of juror
decision-making, though they did illustrate the point that juries and judges
reach similar results though respectively utilizing different reasoning (Frank
1978).
43The approved language of the Seventh Amendment states: In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall otherwise be examined in any Court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law (U. S. Constitution, Amendment VII). It should be noted that the language of the Amendment does not make clear the extent of commitment to community participation. The Amendment recognizes the "right of trial by jury" in "suits oat common law” but it remains vague as to how to determine which suits are "at common law." There is significant ambiguity as to the Constitution’s affirmative support for a continuing role for the civil jury, but the Supreme Court has remained favorable in its interpretation and favors civil jury decision-making, though it has never interpreted the Amendment as a "guarantee” for jury trials. Contrastingly, the Supreme Court has read the Sixth Amendment, which buttresses the criminal trial venue provision of Article III, by clearly stating that a requirement for trial by jury (of the state and district wherein a crime shall have been committed) is fundamental and not, as in trials in civil cases, simply founded on historical precedent.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 83
Does the jury serve the interests of social justice in civil litigation?
How is the process of justice preserved?
Legal commentators who favor its use emphasize the importance of the community’s presence in legal decision-making and the significance of the collective’s expression of popular w ill.. .critics who are more skeptical of the community’s decision-making role disparage the capacity of the jury to grasp the legal issues or move beyond individual self-interest often questioning whether there should be any policy-making or law-making function for the jury and there are many critics of the (federal) jury system that argue that juries are expensive, unpredictable, and inefficient as well as incompetent. (Franlc 1973, 113-116)
There are two competing arguments concerning the civil jury trial
guarantee. The importance of community and shared values and beliefs is
essential to one group while an alternative group emphasizes the more formal
process of rule-making. The groups differ in important ways. For one, the
community is greater than the individual and positive law is just one of the
methods that seeks to find expression in community values. The alternative
viewpoint stresses that a more formal process of law making should be
maintained and that law becomes the product of procedures adopted by the
individual or group but not necessarily a reflection of shared social values.
In a "chicken or the egg” analogy, each group believes in a different
origin or impact of law upon the system of social justice. For one, the
community group, law and the jury system is a natural outgrowth and
reflection of community values. The process of law is not especially viewed as
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 84
a simple outcome of a formal process. Law is seen as a being interactive with
other spheres of social values and morality. For this model, custom or common
law is the mode in the sense that community law is articulated but it is not
created by judges.
For the alternative group, the law, within the social organization, is
the product of a more formal process of law making. Here, procedures
adopted by the individual or group in control of law making are seen as
paramount to the reflection of social values that would be shared or imparted
by its players. In this model, the legislature would be the paradigm but not
because of its "substantive content or its coherence with social values but
because of validity in terms of mode of origin” (Haddon 1994, 25). What is
significant about jury decision-making from decision-making by judges and
legislators? The significance of jury decision-making lies in the understanding
that the jury provides local knowledge, community connection, and local
experience that would not necessarily be available to a single judge. The
interchange of views and the diversity of jury members contribute to the
source of truth, but also allows the members of the community to feel a part
of the larger social justice process.
For citizens of the United States, our multicultural society sometimes
serves to alienate individuals or communities. Jury duty could be viewed as an
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 85
opportunity to assemble in a public forum-to exercise a form of
self-government by ordinary citizens. In the sense that juries deliberate to
achieve consensus, jury service forces the individual to explore competing or
normative understandings. . .[Deliberation] is the route by which small
group pressures produce consensus out of the initial majority'’ (Kalven and
Zeisel 1986, 496). Juries should not seek to represent their own kind, but
should use their "different starting perspectives to educate one another to
defeat prejudiced arguments, and to elevate deliberations to a level where
power goes to the most persuasive" (Abramson 1994, 246).
Though juries are intrinsically a passive body, assertive actions such as
taking notes and asking questions during trial can help transform the trial
process into an interesting and appealing procedure. Some critics have argued
that such innovations have turned the trial process into a combative and
alienating environment, though it does not necessarily follow that this is
always the case. "The ultimate question which a jury must decide is whether,
given all the facts and circumstances of a case, the defendant on trial is
deserving of society’s condemnation and punishment” (Higginbotham 1977,
47).
Juror disenchantment may stem, in part, from their perception that
the administration of justice and, specifically, the quality of representation
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 86
and court procedure does not live up to the fictionalized courtroom drama
portrayed in television programs and popular movies. While some trials can be
down right boring, the average citizen sitting on any given trial is likely to
perceive the process as an educational experience where they have had an
opportunity to converse and to deliberate with other members of society who
have also been summoned for their ability to evaluate and render a fair
judgment.
Juries, critics argue, are expensive and contribute to delay in civil
action. The call to jury service is a type of social tax that is placed on all
potential citizens; however, the costs associated with the judge’s time are far
greater than the costs associated with jury selections and deliberation (Minow
1987). Judge panels, for example, are far more costly than the cost of a jury
structure. The introduction of one-day /one-trial policies in many jurisdictions
has also led to the minimization of the costs of jury trials, both in terms of
economics and citizen sacrifices.
The most apparent strength of the jury system lies in its diversity, or
through the communication among diverse members of the group. Social class
and race distinctions may affect how jurors relate to and make decisions about
litigants. There is probably much yet to be learned in this area of research as
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 87
it applies to small group decision-making, and in particular-jury deliberations.
The Supreme Court has not recognized a fundamental requirement of a
representative jury in the strictest terms, though language in the Court’s cases
suggests that representativeness is of some concern. The Court has said that
the Sixth Amendment requires a "fair and undistorted chance” that the petit
jury "represent a fair cross-section of the community . . .[but] not that the
possibility will ripen into actuality.”44
Though not the focus of this dissertation, juror demographics are an
important element of this juror stress study. Juror dissatisfaction, in part, has
been said to stem from a lack of a sense of full participation in the
decision-making process and juror representativeness can influence that
process. Except in cases where cognizable groups would be inadequately
reflected on the lists, voter registration has generally been used as an
accepted means to assemble jury pools. Voter lists, by themselves are not
usually considered to be complete or representative of many communities.
Juries can be assembled from such lists, but case law only recognizes the
assurance that no group would be systematically excluded. There is no actual
right to have a particular group represented on a venire or petit jury. Some
researchers have maintained that voting lists are not particularly
“ McCray v. Abrams, 750F.2d 1113,1128-29 (1984).
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. representative of the cross-section of the community and that they are drawn
from mainly middle and upper income population groups. "Resistance to using
supplemental juror source lists may reflect bias on the part of administrators
against recognizing a jury right to a social or racial group whose members
demonstrate a lack of civic interest by failing to qualify or maintain
qualifications for voting” (Druff 1985,1555-1585).
At the federal level and at every state level, some occupations are
wholly exempt from jury service. Representatives of select occupations are
granted exemptions because the services they provide are considered to be so
"important” that it would be contrary to "the public interest” to have any of
them not performed for the sake of juror service (Martin 1972, 689). Many of
the exemptions are granted to professional and technical workers such as
physicians, government officials, ministers, and lawyers. Demographically,
many of these professionals are not represented on jury panels. Additionally,
exemptions for financial hardships, ill health, and family responsibility are also
frequently granted to all occupational groups. In an aged National Industrial
Conference Board Report (1954), conscripted salaried workers were
compensated by their employers in almost 80% of the cases, though salaried
workers were compensated only 35% of the time (Martin 1972, 695).
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 89
Historical Development of the Jury
There is probably no one "best” source or version of historical records
that could be depended upon to portray an accurate account of the modern
jury ancestry so, therefore, I have relied upon many. This chapter is devoted
as a cursory attempt at constructing the evolution of the jury institution, its
concept and struggles to become embedded in the fabric of legal theory and
practice. Historical events are comprehended best by recognizing those
responsible for impacting transitions in human evolution, and as such, I will
appropriately frame the summarization of jury institution evolvement to
include the reforms of sovereign leaders. In skipping across the better part of
a millennium, I will selectively highlight only the most significant chapters in
the evolution of jury development.
The earliest versions of jury courts were conceived in Athens during
the fifth century B.C. (Adler 1994). The Athenian jury courts were called
dicasteries. A single case was decided upon by 501 dicasts whereby a majority
of the jurors were needed to reach a verdict. These jurors rendered both the
outcome and the sentence.
Juries in the Roman era up until A.D. 500 were characterized by
smaller dicasteries. These jurors were held by professional advocates who
were prone to comprehensive rhetorical arguments. The continent of Europe
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 90
may have been introduced to this system by the Roman conquerors but the
continuation of the approach most likely failed due to its democratic flavor
during an era of increasingly oppressive emperors. Despite the decline of the
dicasteries, historians have generally recognized that the jury system remained
in existence in Germany and various Scandinavian countries under a system
known as compurgation.
In this very early form of the modern jury, a council consisting of 12
friends of the accused merely pledged an oath as to the person’s innocence or
guilt without the benefit of knowing the facts of the particular case. This
medieval precursor of the modern jury is considered by jury scholars to have
migrated to England from Normandy by William the Conqueror in 1066 (Adler
1994).
Similarly crediting the origins of the jury to the 11th century England
in her work, Simon establishes a particularly noteworthy clarification in
asserting that it was at this point that " .. .jurors served as both witnesses and
triers of the facts” (Simon 1980, 5). Simon’s research corresponds with
Carleton’s conclusion that jurymen in this period became:
. . .regarded as witnesses, and were selected from the neighbors of those most likely to be acquainted with the facts of the case. They were chosen by the court and not, as were the compurgators, selected by the parties to the suit, and they were supposed to be impartial. (Carleton 1900, 468)
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 91
In the middle of the twelfth century, King Henry II, remembered for his
martial war with Eleanor of Aquitaine and for his struggle with Thomas Becket
over the power the church, " .. .is probably the true father of the modern
jury” (Adler 1994, 4). In what were termed recognition panels, Henry II
expanded the jurisdiction of the jury to property disputes (civil cases), and the
process was broadened to include other types of disputes including criminal
matters, although some historians question whether King Henry's reign
recognized criminal jurors (See Abraham 1980,109).
I think it is worth dwelling for a moment on this historic period in the
chronology of jury development since it is at this juncture that English law and
the jury system under Henry II (1154-89) became codified as a permanent part
of the recognized legal system. This period marked the systematization of a
court of permanently appointed professional judges and in which "original
writ” became a part of the administration of law. ". . .[T]he whole structure
of subsequent English Jurisprudence, as distinguished from the common
Germanic inheritance, began in this reign to assume a definite form”
(Carleton 1900, 465).
Though the several great reforms of Henry II did not take the form of
statues (thereby rights under the law were not directly created), the King
affected the law in terms of its administration. The failure to implement
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 92
statutory commitment to the King's reform would later result in the vacating
of at least one of the more important reforms. Under Henry II, the jury began
to review the testimony of summoned witnesses. An important distinction
must be recognized here in that this reform marked the point where juries
ceased to be witnesses and were regarded exclusively as judges as fact.
Though this important evolutionary transformation was not fully
implemented under Henry II, by the time of Edward III, jurors were relieved of
their responsibilities as witnesses. Juries of 12 were also formed under the
Assize of Clarenton where "men of the vicinity” were judges divided into six
groups with different circuits (Carleton 1900, 469). This system where an
appointment of royal judges would go on circuit resulted in the concentration
of judicial authority by the king. Under the authority of the king, a writ would
be issued citing the parties to appear. The writs would be purchased and
could only be issued at the king’s pleasure. While the system of writs endured
many revisions, it was not until the birth Qf Magna Charta that a trial would be
judged (by jury) by those of the same rank as the accused, and not purely of
royally appointed justices.
Jury verdicts were often subject to the influence and direction of
governing bodies at least up to the 17th century, but it was the trial of William
Penn and William Mead, in the 1670 trial in London, which marked the turning
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 93
point where the jury gained its independence from government domination.
Adler recounts the events of the illustrious trial.
With the jury in the case deadlocked over charges that the defendants had illegally preached in the streets, court officials invaded the jury room to determine which jurors favored acquittal. Finding four, the officials locked them up without food or water. When they refused to convict, they were fined and then imprisoned, as was still the custom. But in the case, one of the dissenters, a man named Bushell, took the matter back to court and won a ruling that jurors could no longer be punished for their verdicts. If the judge could compel a jury to find one way or another, wrote Chief Justice Vaughan with seemingly self-evident logic, then 'the Jury is but a troublesome delay, a great charge, and of not use.’ Thanks in part to Bushell’s case, the jury became recognized as an ever-present check against abuses by the authorities. (Adler 1994,4)
The formative period in the development of modern jury evolution,
like the progress of humanity, did not advance at an even or proportionately
increasing pace. The jury and the evolution of law between the 13th and 17th
centuries was relatively uneventful. In this feudal period, Common Law began
to be built from the canon law adopted by Edward I (1272-1307) and earlier by
Henry II. Common Law differs from case law in that "case-law consists of the
rules and principles stated and acted upon by judges in giving decisions.. . in a
system based on case-law, a judge in a subsequent case must have regard to
these matters” (Cross 1991, 3).
This initiation of Common Law-unwritten law based on custom and
tradition-was historically recognized and applied to the monarchy as well
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 94
after Sir Edward Coke replied to his king (James 1,1603-25) that the King "is
not subject to any man, but to God and the law" (Abraham 1980,11). Lord
Coke compiled and analyzed precedents of common law and through his
efforts, increased acceptance of the practice of reporting cases fully in written
maxims and rules. These efforts would later be expanded upon and clarified
by Sir William Blackstone (1723-80) in his Commentaries on the Law of England,
(1765-69). The system of trial by jury is considered to be the most admirable
product of the Common Law (Morris 1911:304).
The English common law tradition stressed uniformity more than
diversity and found its way to the American colonies when James I granted a
charter in 1606 to the Virginia Company-the Company established the
community of Jamestown in the following year (Simon 1980, 5). Virginia
became the first English-speaking colony to afford every accused white person
a jury trial. (Negroes, and some Indians were not afforded opportunities to be
jurymen in Virginia or in other states with slave property codes). The Virginia
Charter set a pattern for legal development and governance for other colonies
in North America throughout the colonial expansion during the seventeenth
and eighteenth centuries (Scott 1930, 86). Though trial by jury was not
guaranteed under the Virginia Charter, few capital cases were tried without a
jury. The Crown government in Virginia established in 1624 provided for jury
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 95
trials in all civil and criminal cases; however, jury trials were abolished in the
Virginia Courts when the money penalty was less than five pounds (Scott 1930,
87).
James I instructed colonial implementation of England's laws, but the
orders were often ignored or disobeyed. The irregular availability of law books
and legal education, along with the lack of England’s oversight translated into
frequent misinterpretations and applications of English law. Despite these
early failures, Virginia became the first English-speaking colony to practice
jury trials and by the mid-eighteenth century, the string of colonies that
spanned between Massachusetts and Georgia began to possess features that
were relatively common.
Petit juries in Virginia were generally composed of 12 white men, but
sometimes numbered as many as 24 (Scott 1930). In 1622, the Virginia
legislature passed a law that required juries of twelve men in all capital cases.
As was the case in 11th century England, jurors were summoned from the
locality where the crime had been committed-though six of the twelve jurors
could be selected from temporary residents. Generally, felony trials lasted
one day and since deliberating jurors were locked up without the benefit of
food or water until a verdict was reached, few trials lasted longer. Since
jurors were not allowed to leave the company of their jurymen until a verdict
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 96
was reached, prolonged disagreements over the guilt or innocence of the
accused were rare.
Virginia juries had broad discretion over the finding of fact and the
rendering of verdicts. In cases where juries preferred to bring verdicts for
offenses less than those originally charged, the judge was permitted to apply
the verdict if the facts arising from the case could be derived from the
applicable case law. In cases where the defendant was acquitted, jailer’s fees
were required to pay the cost of food and lodging (Scott 1930).
Juror selection throughout the colonial period was universally related
to property ownership. Jurors were required to be freeholders in the higher
criminal courts and had to be worth at least 100 pounds in property. In the
county courts, jurors were also required to be freeholders, but needed only to
possess 50 pounds in property. Once a juror was sworn, he could not be
challenged for an insufficient estate (Scott 1930).
In the spirit of the Crown rule, twenty peremptory challenges were
provided by the Virginia legislature, and if this amount was exceeded, the
defendant was automatically convicted. Since county sheriffs usually picked
the juries, it was not uncommon for the sheriff to deliberately pack the jury
panel. Prior to what has been called the "Glorious Revolution (1689), the
creation of court and the appointment of judges were part of the King’s
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 97
prerogative powers" (Simon 1975,28). Increasing tensions between England
and the American colonies during the 1760’s propelled jury independence both
in terms of diminished royal regulation and in terms of increasing colonial
application and administration.
In the period from 1607 through the 1760’s, colonists increased their
concern with defining individuals’ rights. Increasing anxieties regarding juries’
autonomy from imperial direction added to the grounds for colonial unrest and
eventual revolution. The 1787 Constitution incorporated functional separation
of government powers but it was not until the ratification of the ten
amendments (Bill of Rights) in 1791 that clarified it-and limited the national
governments’ new powers. "The fifth, sixth, and seventh amendments are
insights into prevailing ideas and practices concerning justice, trial
procedures, and the jury. The portions of these amendments that pertain to
juries ratified practices that had developed during the century-and-a-half of
colonial status since Virginia’s founding, and affirmed basic principles for
which the colonists had contended in their long struggle against the British"
(Simon 1975, 31).
The Fifth Amendment (with specific exclusions) protects a person from
being tried for a crime unless he is indicted by a grand jury (Article V). The
sixth amendment guarantees a speedy and public trial in all criminal cases and
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 98
the trial must originate in the state in which the offense is alleged to have
been committed (Article VI). The seventh amendment guarantees that the
right to trial by jury shall be preserved and that reexamination of fact as
described by a jury can only be performed by a national court under the rules
of common law (Article VII). Providing further support for the preservation of
the jury system, the Judiciary Act (1789) provided that circuit and district
courts must try all issues of fact by jury except for cases within admiralty and
maritime jurisdiction.
As the colonial transformation toward democracy’s broader
representation continued in the 1800-1850s, religious qualifications for state
citizenship, property, residence, office holding, suffrage, militia and jury
service were further reduced. The presidential administrations of Jackson and
Lincoln saw a marked increase in the election of more and more state and
local judges; formerly, these judges had customarily been elected. In this
intense period characterized by a raging debate over the issue of slavery, many
non-slave state jurors rendered justice in trials involving personal liberty laws.
Though the Civil War effectively wiped out the slave state property laws,
mid-19th century American free-state juries often refused to convict persons
who aided escaping slaves-thereby effectively pioneering a form of jury
nullification.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 99
With the passing of the 14th and 15th amendments (1868,1870), race
no longer could serve as a basis for disqualifying persons from jury service in
state or national courts. Unfortunately, especially in many southern states,
the restriction of jury service to blacks continued. "In many states, jury lists
contained the names of Negroes, but state judges’ bailiffs and marshals called
none for jury service” (Simon 1975, 38).
It was not until 1935 that the Supreme Court struck down this practice
as a violation of the fourteenth amendment. Applying one of the Bill of Rights,
the Supreme Court declared that the right to a speedy and pubic trial in
misdemeanor, criminal, contempt, and even in petty offense cases was
guaranteed by the sixth amendment (Duncan v. Louisiana 1968). Interestingly,
this decision came on the 100th anniversary of the ratification of the
fourteenth amendment.
The Supreme Court continues to move slowly in the interference with
state standards regarding what constitutes a fair trial, especially as this relates
to jury composition; however, in 1970, the Court held that a Florida law
permitting a jury of six to try certain cases was not a violation of the
fourteenth amendment (Williams v. Florida 1970; Simon 1975). The question
of whether the founders of the Constitution meant six or twelve (or some other
number) remains controversial and it is common even in federal courts to
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 100
employ six-person juries in civil cases (Fisher 1973). In 1972, the Court
permitted states to abandon the unanimous verdict requirement (Harper
1994).
A complete summary of the historic development and evolutionary
progression of the jury system of course would require a scholarly devotion to
the penmanship of multiple compositions. The intent of this chapter has been
to provide an outline of basic jury evolvement from its genesis as a concept
through its variations and modifications that have been shaped by historical
compromises and political passions. Where possible, and without unnecessary
detail, I have attempted to provide an understanding of jury evolution within
significant historical intervals. It is my hope that the reader will have been
provided a meaningful historic perspective on this venerable and timeless norm
within of our legal culture.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. CHAPTER IV
FINDINGS/INTERPRETATION OF THE DATA
Overview
This secondary analysis survey study offers insight into the operation of
the jury system in our courts by analyzing juror stress in judicial districts which
have implemented the one-day/one-trial policy. Until recently, systematic
reforms aimed at producing a positive jury experience have been neglected by
the courts. Satisfaction with the juror experience lies at the heart of the jury
reform movement, yet, prior to the 1970’s, courts placed identification of the
nature of the problem low on the agenda.
In the 1970’s and 1980’s researchers concentrated their efforts on
analyzing the problem of wasted or underutilized juror time. This perception
of the iuror served as the focal point in many of those social science
investigations and, increasingly, researchers began to be concerned with the
perceptions and judgments of the juror experience. Such studies were
beneficial to the courts in that they provided innovative methods for managing
jury systems more effectively by employing methods for shortening the length
101
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 102
of service time, increasing fees for jurors, and making the jury experience
more comfortable in physical terms.
Implicit in the original study design of this research is the concept that
those who are called to serve to jury service, to some degree, experience a
level of stress. The original study design specifically captured from surveys of
jurors their responses to the jury experience as lesser or greater degrees of
stress for each of the juror survey questions. This is an important departure
from previous studies which attempted to measure juror dissatisfaction overall
or specifically.
In 1993, the American Bar Association Judicial Administration Division
Committee on Jury Standards issued "Standards Relating to Juror Use and
Management.” Within that compendium, in Standard 5, an important charge
relating to the term of jury service was revealed:
Standard 5: TERM OF AND AVAILABILITY FOR JURY SERVICE
The time that persons are called upon to perform jury service and to be available therefore should be the shortest period consistent with the needs of justice.
(a) A term of service of one day or the completion of one trial, whichever is longer, is recommended. However, a term of one week or the completion of one trial, whichever is longer, is acceptable.
(b) Persons should not be required to maintain a status of availability for jury service for longer than two weeks except in areas with few
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 103
’r jury trials when it may be appropriate for persons to be available for service over a longer period of time.
As of 1995, two years after the America?* Bar Association’s
recommendations were released, over one*third of the U.S. population lived in
jurisdictions (including rural and metropolitan courts) that used a term of
service of one-day/one-trial (Munsterman et al. 1986, 65). Munsterman
suggests that the one change in jury systems over the past twenty years that
has resulted in the greatest effect on the citizens called to jury service is the
length of service under a one-day/one-trial policy. From the perspective of
the potential juror, the length of the term largely determines the amount of
hardship placed upon each individual. In this study, hardships were responded
to by jurors in the form of levels of stress associated with being away from
their workplace, the potential loss of income, receiving a jury summons, etc.
Individuals who are not being paid while serving obviously would be concerned
with financial loss, but the uncertainty of having to be available over a long
period of time and not knowing whether the court will again require them to
report in jurisdictions not employing a one-day/one-trial policy should present
a noticeable difference in comparative stress levels as compared with jurors
who’s length of service is well-defined. The findings later in this section will
support this interpretation.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 104
Despite the best effort by jury managers, jurors are exposed to
unavoidable waiting periods. The management of the jury system can
Influence better or worse results. However, with reduced terms of service,
the waiting experienced by each person is reduced significantly, despite the
varying degrees of management influence.
Subjective judgments relating to demographic backgrounds of jurors
such as those analyzed in this research are not expected to produce highly
structured suggestions as to how jury managers would be able to influence 1 policies that would lessen stress for those more or less educated, for older or
younger persons, etc., but it is important to the field that, in the very least,
these findings be brought forward.
The empirical findings in this study allow us to conclude that for jurors
serving in one-day/one-trial jurisdictions, overall stress levels are significantly
less than for jurors serving in non-one-day/one-trial jurisdictions. The
dependent measures analyzed in this research enable an investigation of the
extent of overall stress as explained by the combination of dependent
measures arrayed under study constructs of process and service models of
stress. Essentially, the decision to sum scores across five distinct domains of
stress measures (for each model/service and process) was based on two
considerations: (1) an inspection of independent model variable correlations
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 105
suggests no need to weight the responses to separate stress indicator levels
and (2) using a sum of scores to reflect juror stress allows a straightforward
interpretation of partial regression coefficients derived from a multiple
regression analysis of stress.
Model Test
The first model (Service) incorporates the following independent
variables: receiving summons, waiting for jury assignment, reporting for duty,
disruption to daily routine and, limits on actions during jury service, with the
predictors one-day/one-trial, age, gender, race, relationship status, high
school, college, self-employed/PT, fulltime, marginal income, children,
managerial, professional/ technical, service, deliberations (hours), and jurors
(number on panel). The significance is shown by F (4.032). (F would equal
2.08 or less at P < .05 if no significant increase in stress was found.)
Table 22 demonstrates that, for the Service stress model, the block of
independent variables is systematically related to the dependent variables
(service stress model) and that stress is influenced by the predictors at a
significant level (P < .001). The degrees of freedom (14) are a perfect fit and
represent the number of coefficients estimated plus one for the constant. The
R2 (.15), or degrees of variation in the measure, demonstrates that this is a
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 106
good model in terms of measuring variables which are theoretically and
empirically related to the dependent variables.
Table 22. Model Summary Table-Service Stress (second cite)
N df R2 Sig 386 14 .15 4.032 p < .001 a. Predictors: (Constant) ONE-DAY/ONE-TRIAL, AGE, GENDER, RACE, RELATIONSHIP STATUS, HIGH SCHOOL, COLLEGE, SELF-EMPLOYED/PT, FULL TIME, MARGINAL INCOME, CHILDREN, MANAGERIAL, PROFESSIONAL/TECHNICAL, SERVICE, DELIBERATIONS (HOURS), AND JURORS (# ON PANEL). b. Dependent Variable: SERVICE *N * sample size; df = degrees of freedom (# of cells less the number of restrictions or constraints placed on the model); Rz - test of variation or degrees of variation within values in the group of dependent variables; F » significance test; Sig * significance level.
Table 23 demonstrates that, for the Process stress model, the block of
independent variables is also systematically related to the dependent variables
(process stress model) and that stress is influenced by the predictors at a
significant level (P < .001). The degrees of freedom (14) are a perfect fit and
represent the number of coefficients estimated plus one for the constant. The
R2 (.18), or degrees of variation in the measure, demonstrates that this is a
good model in terms of measuring the extent of correlation between
independent variables which are theoretically and empirically related to the
dependent variables.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 107
Table 23. Model Summary Table-Process Stress (second cite)
N df R2 Sig 386 14 .18 5.110 p < .001
a. Predictors: (Constant) ONE-DAY/ONE-TRIAL, AGE, GENDER, RACE, RELATIONSHIP STATUS, HIGH SCHOOL, COLLEGE, SELF-EMPLOYED/PT, FULLTIME, MARGINAL INCOME, CHILDREN, MANAGERIAL, PROFESSIONAL/TECHNICAL, SERVICE, DELIBERATIONS (HOURS), AND JURORS (# ON PANEL). b. Dependent Variable: PROCESS *N = sample size; df = degrees of freedom (# of cells less the number of restrictions or constraints placed on the model); R2 = test of variation or degrees of variation within values in the group of dependent variables; F = significance test; Sig = significance level.
Though the process stress model tests as equally or even more
significant (F = 5.110), for purposes of this study, it will not be used further as
a research model though it will be explained thoroughly in terms of its
usefulness. As the later coefficient tables will show, the process stress model
is, in reality, only significant due to its inclusion of two distinguishing
independent variables (deliberation in hours and number of jurors on the
panel). In other words, the strength of these two variables heavily influences
the model, and an absence of the two variables would render the model
insignificant (see Table 24).
Note from Table 24 that when eliminating the variables deliberation in
hours and number of jurors on the panel, the significance of the model drops
from the scale, and the F score also falls appreciably. Despite the model’s
overall significance, by excluding the last two variables, the model becomes
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. irrelevant. Before focusing on the implications of these two specific variables,
a discussion of the relevant coefficient tables now follows.
Table 24. Model Summary Table-Process Stress (minus deliberation and jurors)
N df Sig 386 14 .043 1.18 .288
a. Predictors: (Constant) ONE-DAY/ONE-TRIAL, AGE, GENDER, RACE, RELATIONSHIP STATUS, HIGH SCHOOL, COLLEGE, SELF-EMPLOYED/PT, FULLTIME, MARGINAL INCOME, CHILDREN, MANAGERIAL, PROFESSIONAL/TECHNICAL, AND SERVICE. b. Dependent Variable: PROCESS *N = sample size; df = degrees of freedom (# of cells less the number of restrictions or constraints placed on the model); Rl = test of variation or degrees of variation within values in the group of dependent variables; F = significance test; Sig = significance level.
The coefficient table measures (for both the process and service stress
models) the significance of each of the intervening independent variables
tested against the models. The table also includes a beta measurement, which
explains the coefficients by the independent variables, and a standard error
which is stated as the variation of beta for the observations or disbursements
of the observations (low scores represent better fits). The T test is a test of
statistical significance measured as two-tail tests at p = < .05/<.01/<.001, and
measures the differences of the means and, ultimately, a decrease or increase
in service stress (base = 2.08).
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 109
Coefficient Table Findings (SERVICE MODEL)
Table 25. Coefficient Table (Service) (second cite) STANDARD FACTOR B T ERROR Constant 7.93 2.02 3.91*** ONE-DAY/ONE-TRIAL -1.11 .498 -2.24* AGE -.032 .022 .982 GENDER -.044 .496 -.090 RACE -.635 .603 -1.05 RELATIONSHIP STATUS -.355 .542 -.655 HIGH SCHOOL -2.55 .790 -3.24** COLLEGE -.849 .665 -1.27 SELF- 2.20 1.02 2.15* EMPLOYED/PART-TIME FULL TIME .985 .981 1.01 MARGINAL INCOME *2.23 .735 -3.03** CHILDREN .403 .222 1.81 MANAGERIAL -1.79 .745 -2.41* PROFESSIONAL/TECH -.189 .574 -.330 SERVICE 1.40 .838 1.67 DELIBERATIONS .032 .037 .865 JURORS .053 .091 .583
Dependent Variable: SERVICE, R2 * .15, F * 4.032, p < .001 (Two tail) * - p < .05, ** - p < .01, *** « p< .001 (B « Beta, the value for the coefficient constant (7.93) which equals the mean value for the dependent variables if the value for all other factors set to 0; T represents the value of the coefficient by standard error and indicates whether the coefficient is significant ( 2.08 is significant)). Bold starred variables mark significant coefficients.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 110
For the factor CONSTANT, service stressor variables are tested for all
independent variables set at 0. In other words, if all of the other factors
tested (age, gender, race, etc.) were arbitrarily set at zero, the measure of
stress, as determined by the T score, would be 3.91***.
For the factor ONE-DAY/ONE-TRIAL, stress is decreased as evidenced
by the T score of -2.24*. In other words, jurors who serve in one-day/one-trial
courts are less stressed than those serving in non-one-day/one-trial courts and
to a significant level (P < .001).
For the factor AGE, there is no appreciable or significant effect on
stress, though what is evident is that as the age of the juror increases, slightly
more stress is experienced based upon this variable alone. The T test does not
reach statistical significance for this variable.
For the factor GENDER, there is no appreciable or significant effect on
stress. The T test does not reach statistical significance for this variable.
For the factor RACE, there is no appreciable or significant effect on
stress.
For the factor RELATIONSHIP STATUS, there is no appreciable or
significant effect on stress.
For the factor HIGH SCHOOL, stress is significantly decreased as
evidenced by the T score of -3.24**. In other words, jurors who have attained
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 111
a high school education are significantly less stressed than those who have, for
instance, attained a college education (-1.27).
For the factor COLLEGE, there is no appreciable or significant effect on
stress.
For the factor SELF-EMPLOYED/PART-TIME, stress increases for those
who are self-employed, a student or part-time worker to a significant level
(2.15*).
For the factor FULL TIME, there is no appreciable or significant effect
on stress.
For the factor MARGINAL INCOME, stress is significantly decreased as
evidenced by the T score of -3.03**. In other words, jurors who earn more
than $20K annually (as opposed to those earning below $20K) were significantly
more stressed.
For the factor CHILDREN, there is no significant effect on stress,
though what is evident is that as the nupitger of children (of jurors) increases,
slightly more stress is experienced based upon the T test score of 1.81. The T
test does not reach statistical significance for this variable but does approach
it.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 112
For the factor MANAGERIAL, stress is significantly decreased as
evidenced by the T score of -2.41*. In other words, compared with jurors who
are not in the managerial ranks, those who are experience less stress.
For the factor PROFESSIONAL/TECH, there is no appreciable or
significant effect on stress.
For the factor SERVICE, there is no significant effect on stress though
what is evident is that for those jurors employed in the service profession,
slightly more stress is experienced (than their counterparts who are not in the
service or managerial fields), and the value of 1.67 though not reaching
statistical significance, does approach it.
For the factor DELIBERATIONS (in hours), there is no appreciable or
significant effect on stress. (The process model demonstrates a radically
different T test score with regard to this variable, and will be highlighted in
the process model coefficient table findings.)
For the factor JURORS (number of jurors deciding the case: 6, 7-11,
and 12), there is no appreciable or significant effect on stress. (The process
model demonstrates a radically different T test score, as well as means test
scores, with regard to this variable, and will be highlighted in the process
model coefficient table findings.)
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 113
For the factors which approached or reached significance in the
service model, further analysis of their implications will follow in the
conclusion section. In the following section, the remaining model (Process) is
reviewed using the coefficient table.
Coefficient Table Findings (PROCESS MODEL)
Table 26. Coefficient Table (Process) (second cite) STANDARD FACTOR B T ERROR Constant 2.78 2.25 1.23 ONE-DAY/ONE-TRIAL -.682 .554 -1.23 AGE -.04 .025 -1.76 GENDER -.206 .552 -.374 RACE -.408 .672 -.607 RELATIONSHIP STATUS -.356 .603 -.591 HIGH SCHOOL -1.57 .879 -1.78 COLLEGE -.338 .741 -.457 SELF- 1.31 1.14 1.15 EMPLOYED/PART-TIME FULL TIME .653 1.09 .598 MARGINAL INCOME -.874 .818 -1.06 CHILDREN _ .012 .248 .049 MANAGERIAL -1.16 .830 -1.40 PROFESSIONAL/TECH .328 .639 -.406
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 114
TABLE 26 (cont.)
SERVICE -3.78 .933 1.67
DELIBERATIONS .265 .041 6.44***
JURORS .405 .101 4.00***
Dependent Variable: PROCESS, R2 - .18, F = 5.11, p < .001 (Two tail) * = p < .05, ** = p < .01, *** = p< .001 (B * Beta, the value for the coefficient constant (2.78) which equals the mean value for the dependent variables if the value for all other factors set to 0; T represents the value of the coefficient by standard error and indicates whether the coefficient is significant ( 2.08 is significant)). Bold starred variables mark significant coefficients.
For the factor CONSTANT, process stressor variables are tested for all
independent variables set at 0. In other words, if all of the other factors
tested (age, gender, race, etc.), were arbitrarily set at zero, the measure of
stress, as determined by the T score, would be 1.23 and does not approach
significance. Resultantly, this model, though tested thoroughly, is rendered
irrelevant for further consideration from this study. In other words, process
stress, as provided by the process stress model which includes the variables 1)
dissension among jurors; 2) receiving jury instructions; 3) deciding on a
verdict; 4) jury deliberation; and 5) possibility of making a mistake, did not
test as statistically significant when run against the predictor variables
excluding deliberations (in hours) and number of jurors on panel. Recall that
process stressor variables selected were chosen on the basis of their ability to
predict results (jury stress) due to jurors’ experiences of having actually served
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 115
as a juror. More specifically, the selected process stressor variables were
selected for their ability to assess the level of stress from the actual
performance of jury duty. This model has been statistically tested as
irrelevant whereas the tested performance measures of jury duty by jurors
does not have the same impact as the service measure model which tests the
ability to predict results (jury stress) due to jurors simply being brought into
iurv service.
For the factor ONE-DAY/ONE-TRIAL, there is no appreciable or
significant effect on stress.
For the factor AGE, there is no appreciable or significant effect on
stress, though what is evident is that as the age of the juror increases, slightly
less stress is experienced based upon this variable alone. The T test does not
reach significance for this variable. Recall that for the Service model, an
increase of the age of the juror resulted in slightly greater stress level.
For the factors GENDER, RACE, and RELATIONSHIP STATUS, there are
no appreciable or significant effects on stress.
For the factor HIGH SCHOOL, there is no appreciable or significant
effect on stress, though as in the Service Stress Model, stress does slightly
decrease for those who have attained less education. This significance level
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 116
approaches significance (-1.78); however it does not attain the threshold of
statistical significance.
For the factors COLLEGE, SELF-EMPLOYED/PART-TIME, FULLTIME,
MARGINAL INCOME, CHILDREN, MANAGERIAL, PROFESSIONAL/TECH, and
SERVICE there are no appreciable or significant effects on stress.
For the factor DELIBERATION (in hours), statistical significance is
attained (6.44***). For each additional hour of jury deliberation reported,
jurors experience an increase of stress-nearly 1/3 of a point per additional
hour of deliberation.
For the factor JURORS (number of jurors on deliberation panel),
statistical significance is attained (4.00***). Juror stress is increased as the
composition of the juror panel increases-nearly 1 /2 of a point per additional
juror. It is interesting to note that ip the Service stress model, JURORS
(number of jurors deciding the case: 6, 7.-11,12) reveals that there no
appreciable or significant effect on stress as the number of deliberating jurors
on the panel increases.
As demonstrated in the simple frequency distribution table (Table 27),
when comparing the responses for jurors of one-day/one-trial courts against
jurors in non-one-day/one-trial courts, stress responses are consistently less
for respondents of one-day/one-trial jurisdictions. This finding is particularly
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 117
confirmed for almost all responses past the level of seven (on a scale of 0-19,
with nineteen representing the highest level of stress). When considering the
frequency of scores for juror stress in the lowest range (0-7), the presence of
scores from the one-day/one-trial group is generally greater in number than
that of the non-one-day/one-trial group.
In Graph 1, the numeric differences were plotted for each stress score
distribution from one through twenty to highlight the raw process model
frequency score distribution between one-day/one-trial and
non-one-day/one-trial groups. From the graphics revealed in this table, the
frequency distribution between both groups can be appreciated as absolute
differences in the groups’ two scores. Note that for one-day/one-trial
respondents, a greater number of lower stress scores (0-7) are held as
compared with the non-one-day/one-trial group. Accordingly, note that stress
level scores beyond seven are generally occupied by the respondents in the
non-one-day/one-trial group. The chart tables are offered to visually
demonstrate the previous statistical conclusion that for the Service Stress
Model, stress levels for jurors serving in one-day/one-trial jurisdictions are less
than for their counterparts in non-one-day/one-trial jurisdictions.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. without prohibited reproduction Further owner. copyright the of permission with Reproduced Trial FREQUENCY (Number of responses) RawIllustrationData 1.Process Stress by One-Day/One-Trial vs. Non-One-Day/One
118 119
Table 27. Raw Data Process Stress by One-Day/One-Trial vs. Non-One-Day/One- Trial by Numeric Frequency Distribution
NOT ONE- ONE-DAY/ONE SCORE1 DAY/ONE TOTAL2 TRIAL2 TRIAL2
0 18 25 43
1 15 12 27
2 19 19 38
3 13 20 33
4 16 14 30
5 9 13 22
6 11 17 28
7 20 14 34
8 12 13 25
9 18 8 26
10 13 3 16
11 11 5 16
12 6 4 10
13 5 2 7
14 4 3 7
15 1 0 1
16 2 3 5
17 2 4 6
18 4 1 5
19 2 1 3
1 Score varies from 0 to 19:0 * no stress/ 19 » greatest stress 2 Frequency of responses
In Graph 2, just the numeric differences are graphed from least to
most stress by non-one-day/one-trial scores and by one-day/one-trial scores.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 120
From the graph, it is plain to see that the majority of lowest stress scores
appear for one-day/one-trial respondents, generally from the 0-7 range, while
conversely, a greater number of high stress scores, generally from the score of
8 and beyond, are most represented by the,non-one-day/one-trial respondents.
Illustration 2. Difference in Frequency Scores for Raw Data Process Stress by
One-Day/One-Trial vs. Non-One-Day/One-Trial
«/)8 C OBdey & •Total $
2 E
> u 5 o f LU £
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 121
Table 28. Difference in Frequency Scores for Raw Data Process Stress by One- Day/One-Trial vs. Non-One-Day/One-Trial by Numeric Difference
SCORE SCORE NOT ONE- ONE- DIFFERENCE FOR DIFFERENCE FOR SCORE1 DAY/ONE DAY/ONE TOTAL2 NON-ONE- ONE-DAY/ONE- TRIAL2 TRIAL1 DAY/ONE-TRIAL TRIAL
0 18 25 0 7 43
1 15 12 3 0 27
2 19 19 0 0 38
3 13 20 0 7 33
4 16 14 2 0 30
5 9 13 0 4 22
6 11 17 0 6 28
7 20 14 6 0 34
8 12 13 0 1 25
9 18 8 10 0 26
10 13 3 10 0 16
11 11 5 6 0 16
12 6 4 2 0 10
13 5 2 3 0 7
14 4 3 1 0 7
15 1 0 1 0 1
16 2 3 0 1 5
17 2 4 0 2 6
18 4 1 3 0 5
19 2 1 0 1 3
1 Score varies from 0 to 19: 0 * no stress/ 19 » greatest stress 2 Frequency of responses
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. CHAPTER V
FINDINGS/ANALYSIS OF THE OATA
Overview
In many respects, this section represents a focal point which will
principally serve to relate the most relevant portions of the
Findings/Interpretation of the Data section with insights from applicable field
literature. In keeping with the clinical approach of devoting a well-defined
precision to each of the major chapter subjects, I have made the choice to
separate the simple interpretation of the data from the discrete and final
chapter which will tie field-based practical insights to the key findings.
The original intent and design of this study was to test whether the
construction of two models (Process and Service) would demonstrate that juror
stress would be reduced in the respondent pool surveyed from
one-day/one-trial jurisdictions. For both models, the tests of significance
confirmed this hypothesis as shown in the previous section. The Process stress
model was formulated upon the concept of juror’s experiences of having
actually served as a iuror generally. More specifically, the process stressor
122
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 123
variables were selected for their ability to assess the level of stress from the
actual performance of jury duty. Though the Process model was proven
statistically significant, in the end, it was eliminated from the study. Two
variables tested against the model accounted for the statistical scores, but in
eliminating the two variables, the rest of the model proved insignificant.
It should be pointed out that the two predictor variables in this model
(deliberations in hours and number of jurors serving on panel) that were
individually significant were statistically relevant. That is to say that despite
the overall construction of the model-and the decision to eliminate it from
the study-it must be noted that process stress is increased significantly as the
number of hours of deliberation increases and as the number of jurors
increases on the jury panel. To my awareness, no other appropriate field
study or survey research has documented this finding.45 It should also be
underscored that the model itself was constructed on the basis that juror
responses proved statistically significant for the five response questions.
Dissension among jurors, receiving jury instructions, deciding on a verdict, jury
45The National Center for State Courts' originaX$tressstudy collected this survey data but did not concentrate on this facet in its data analysis^
%
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 124
deliberation, and the possibility of making a mistake are categories where
respondents indicated the greatest juror stress.46
The Service model also tested as significant. Even when testing the
model without the predictor variables, stress for jurors is significantly reduced
for respondents of one-day/one-trial jurisdictions (T = -2.24, p = < .01). The
model includes the variables receiving summons, waiting for jury assignment,
reporting for duty, disruption to daily routine, limits on actions during jury
service. (See also Tables 16 and 17, independent T-Tests of Variables
Constituting the Service Stress and Process Stress Measures).
Analysis of the SERVICE MODEL Coefficient Table
The focus of this dissertation is truly unique, and, therefore, there is a
dearth of collaborating field research which can be drawn into the analyses
and review of the following findings. Few, if any, research studies have
concentrated on elaborating upon the measurement of juror stress in terms of
demographic categories. With that said, this study's significant predictor
variables will be analyzed against a backdrop of court reform research
generally aimed at increasing juror satisfaction with the jury process, reducing
4®Though this study was not designed to verify or disprove the findings of the original National Center for State Courts study, individual SPSS tests on the response data from the Jury Duty Stress Scale questionnaire responses did verify that the questions (dissension among jurors, receiving jury instructions, deciding on a verdict, jury deliberation, and the possibility of making a mistake) were in fact accurate in terms of their ranking of juror stress responses.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 125
juror stress, and enhancing juror pool representation. Where appropriate,
other relevant court reform topics will be introduced.
Several predictor variables tested against the Service model were
found to correlate at statistically significant levels (T = above 2.08). The
study’s main hypothesis was confirmed in that overall stress, as measured by
the Service model, decreased for respondents from one-day/one-trial
jurisdictions (-2.24, P = < .05). Specific predictor variables also tested as
significant, in that they either demonstrated an increase or decrease in
measurable stress.
High School Education and Stress
One such statistically significant predictor variable, high school (-3.24,
P = < .01), demonstrates that reported stress was actually less for respondents
who achieved educational levels up to and graduating from high school (as
opposed to achieving higher levels of education such as college or graduate
study (-1.27)). In other words, for those respondents possessing education
levels up to and through high school, stress levels were significantly less than
for college graduates.
This finding should be of interest to the general community of my
readers as it dovetails with other research findings that the segment of jurors
who are less stressed (less educated) should be broadened. This result can be
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 126
accomplished through the use of alternative juror pools such as driver’s
licenses, hunting licenses and other less relied upon jury pool sources. Several
supreme court task forces have recommended that their source lists be
expanded to include licensed vehicle drivers, state identicard holders, high
school graduates, and those to whom utility bills and state income tax forms
are mailed (National Center for State Courts 1994). In broadening the sample
populations that we currently use to mine jurors (beyond the typical voters
and property databases), a more representative sample could be produced and
at the same time a broader pool of less educated, but less stressed jurors
would be attained.
This concept relies upon the assumption that there are correlations
that can be validated between higher education and greater representation in
the eligible and available juror population pool. The juror pool in this study
does indeed validate this assumption as the pool of jurors who have attained
up to a high school education represented a mere 23% of the juror population,
whereas jurors who have attained up to a college or graduate degree
represented a full 77% of the juror pool. Other studies which have collected
juror demographic information also find that similar trends exist with regard to
the relatively small percentage of high school educated as compared with
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 127
those who have completed college or graduate school.47 In a national survey of
how the public views the state courts performed by the National Center for
State Courts, 56% of respondents agreed that "Most juries are not
representative of the community” (National Center for State Courts 1999, 7).
In obtaining an adequate cross-section of available juror population,
one may ask whether courts are unwittingly skewing the juror pool. According
to a 1998 report of District of Columbia juror participation, nearly 20 percent
of D.C. citizens chose to ignore jury duty when summoned, while an additional
43 percent of the city’s residents never receive the jury summons in the first
place; overall, fewer than a quarter of citizens who are summoned were
actually qualified and appeared for jury service (The United States Law Week
1998,1).
The use of additional source lists for culling new jurors such as income
tax mailing lists, public assistance rolls, and the register of newly naturalized
citizens could serve to expand the jury pool and enhance its
representativeness. For researchers interested in addressing citizen apathy
and inaccurate juror source lists, this finding is significant in that it shows that
this study’s juror pool does not adequately represent lower-educated jurors.
47ln a 1998 study performed by the American Bar Association Division for Media Relations and Public Affairs, researchers collected juror demographic information from a sample population of 1000 respondents and found that the level of education of the respondents for high school or less was 31%, while those with college/post grad accounted for 69%.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 128
(Recall that, in part, this study’s findings established that lower educated
jurors are under-represented and that lower educated jurors are also less
stressed than their college and post grad counterparts). By increasing the jury
pool to draw more people and broader representation into the process which
would allow for the increase of the possibility for lower educated citizens to
serve, jury pools would be comprised of less stressed citizens. Less stressed
jurors make for better jurors.
The challenge to future research may lie in the question: What can
courts do to translate this finding (lower educated jurors experience less
stress) to the larger juror population pool-those who are college educated or
those with post graduate degrees? This challenge should be most certainly an
interesting subject worthy of additional in-depth study.
Efforts to increase juror comprehension or recognize special juror . t service categories may serve to relieve stress on the over-represented better-
educated pool.
• Greater use of court-appointed experts in all technical- or science-based cases
• Experimentation with blue ribbon juries for technical- or science- based cases to make more pointed use of unique juror qualifications (segmentation of jury pool for specially appointed service based on professional or academic juror qualifications)
• Judicial case management strategies to segregate complex case claims at issue for submission to court appointed experts to make
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 129
preliminary findings to court; such experts could be either special masters or blue-ribbon jury for later submission to general jury panels
• Judicial case management strategies that insure more comprehensive juror-education in independent cases are likely to induce service stress
• Better and regularized use of juror exit questionnaires and/or exit interviews targeted at stress inducing conditions to key reform strategies to actual stress inducers and to uncover other stress inducers
Income and Stress
Given that high school educations do not, generally, equate to higher
earnings when compared with those who have earned college degrees, one
could reasonably deduce that the social/economic costs of jury service may
have some linking implication to this study’s second significant predictor
variable. We now turn to the second significant finding: marginal income.
The study’s coefficient table which tested service predictors shows
that marginal income (coded as household income §19,999 or below, and
20,000 and above) T tested at - 3.03, P = < .01. This is a very significant
statistical finding in that it demonstrates that as income increases, stress is
significantly reduced for the surveyed jurors in this study. To restate, jurors
with lower incomes are more stressed.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. In this study, surveyed jurors reporting less than $20,000 in income
represented only 12 percent of the survey population whereas those earning
over $20,000 comprised the larger share of 88 percent. In this study, surveyed
jurors earning up to $30,000 represented a 27 percent share of the jury pool
population. So, while lower income jurors are significantly more stressed
(than jurors in higher income brackets), there are less of them who eventually
served as jurors in this study. These income groups, as percentages, closely
match the United States population according to a survey performed by the
American Bar Association (American Bar Association 1998, 3), so in terms of
representation, one could argue that a fair statistical cross-section of incomes
was realized.
Despite this, the finding demonstrates that jurors in the lowest
economic income levels experience significantly greater stress than their
counterparts. Few persons making minimum wage can afford to take a sudden
and involuntary pay cut for almost any length of time. For many prospective
jurors, the question becomes one of whether their wages will be continued
during jury duty. It would follow that for jurors afforded guaranteed wages
during their jury service, less stress-at least in terms of economic pressure
would seem to follow. State legislatures have been reluctant to equalize the
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 131
economic burden of jury duty by enacting legislation which would require
employers to guarantee a worker’s wages during jury service.
One may reasonably assume that income levels for high school
graduates are marginal and on this basis alone, lower income jurors’ economic
well-being would unsurprisingly be threatened. Though a study performed by
Fukurai and Butler on economic excuses and jury participation concentrated on
the economics of jurors who were granted excuses to serve, the study is
relevant in the sense that its findings seem to correlate with this study’s
discovery that for jurors, less income suggests greater levels of stress. In that
study, Fukurai and Butler conclude that the single most important determinant
of an economic excuse is the potential jurors’ status with regard to specific
compensation policies afforded by their employer (Fukurai et al. 1991, 61).
Prospective jurors in that study who lacked company support (compensation
while in jury service), were far more likely to ask for an excuse because of
economic hardship. Furthermore, Fukurai also found that almost a third of the
prospective jurors said that their firms would pay while they served on juries,
while two-thirds of them said that their companies would not pay.
In Robert Boatright’s study of generations, age groups, and jury service
(Boatright 2001, 2), he compared the data from two similar studies-the
National Center for State Courts/Hearst Foundation study of public confidence
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 132
In the state courts and the Losh, Wasserman, and Wasserman study of
"reluctant jurors" in the Second Judicial Circuit of Florida.4* Boatright
establishes that, as with the summons non-response report, findings of
previous research indicate that one of the primary and significant major
barriers to jury service (across age groups) are economic barriers.49 The need
for greater attention by the courts to address child care and employer
compensation is highlighted.50
From an analytical view of the relationship between juror income and
stress, lower income (and greater stress) for jurors could be based upon job
security and greater control over the work place/employer compensation. The
ability to participate in jury service is at least theoretically open to all cross
sections of the population. However, as this study’s finding demonstrates, for
those who have made the necessary sacrifices to serve, jurors at the lower
income levels do so with significantly greater stress. We have also been able
to recognize from this study that those within the lowest economic parameters
choosing to serve are statistically balanced with representativeness of the
“ The study of public confidence in the state courts authored by the National Center for State Courts has also been cited within previous discussions in this study.
“ Boatright also refers to the work of Robert Putnam (Bowling Alone. NY: Simon and Schuster, 2000).
“ Boatright states that 8.3% of the 18 to 30 year-old group required child care in order to serve, while a lower concentration of younger people (18*30) who are employed (58%) would receive compensation if they served
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 133
general population-however, in other studies cited, those jurors comprised of
the lowest economic income classes are not adequately represented when
compared with general population figures. Indeed, in another study performed
by Fukurai (1996), the author states, "Despite the Court's emphasis on jurors’
ascriptive characteristics to rectify unrepresentative juries, the analysis
suggests that it may be equally important to examine the effect of economic
hardship excuses and the significant under-representation of economically
impoverished groups on jury panels” (Fukurai 1996,82).
Again, for courts, there are a number of important policy implications
from the present research finding. Policymakers reviewing these findings will
not learn anything new in that perspective jurors within the ranks of the
lowest income levels are not generally well-represented on juries. However,
having demonstrated that prospective jurors from the lowest income levels
experience significantly higher levels of stress as compared with their more
affluent counterparts, judicial planners should concentrate their efforts to
extend protection to this cognizable group. Though it may be difficult for
policymakers to provide wage guarantees based on occupational standing and
income, it may be an important judicial step in rectifying their under
representation of jury panels. Court planners, as a matter of both social
equity and equality before the law, should focus on approaches and methods
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 134
to both increase representation and reduce the stress levels of those who are
willing to serve from this group.
One important way judicial policymakers can respond to this research
is by considering this study’s findings and working toward increasing both the
compensation of jurors and addressing the economic impact of jury service by
implementing one-day/one-trial policies. The one-day/one-trial model has the
potential to significantly reduce stress, regardless of other important factors
including economic, education, or work status. While policies related to jury
reform cannot address all of the implications associated with the increased
stress for lower-income jurors, policymakers can examine the concept of
shifting economic cost onto the private sector by requiring employers to
continue employee salaries through their shorter term of jury duty in a one-
day/one-trial system. Juror compensation could be tripled for jurors required
to serve longer than one week and quadrupled for jurors serving more than two
weeks. Such policies would go far to help encourage participation by the most
under-represented groups while also reducing the stress levels. Future
research could be directed in determining if such policies would, in fact
reduce juror stress.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 135
Self-Emploved/Part-Time
A third predictor variable, self-employed/student/part-time (includes
retired, homemaker, and unemployed) also tested as significant (2.15*). As
compared with respondents in the fulltime category (1.01), this group of
respondents experienced significantly greater stress. This finding also contains
interesting implications for public policy administrators. In this study,
part-time, self-employed, student, retired, or homemakers (as a group) made
up only 23 percent of the jury population while those with full-time jobs
weighed in at 77 percent of the jury population. One might ask why these
respondents with less than full time jobs (or who are self-employed) are more
stressed than their counterparts with full-time job security. The answer to this
question may lie, in part, in simple economics. In a Los Angeles Times article
(Los Angeles Times 1998, 2), staff writer Ann O’Neil reports that in a one year
period, over 1.2 million people did not qualify for jury service in L.A. County.
Reasons ranged from not speaking English to being in jail, but an additional
800,000 people claimed undue hardship. Half of this group made this claim
because they were self-employed or their companies would not reimburse
them for their days of jury service. For the relatively few who served (from
the present study’s juror population (27%)) who came from the ranks of the
retired, the homemaker, the self-employed and student, would it not
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 136
inherently follow that this group’s level of stress would be greater than for
those with full-time positions and for those who are not self-employed? Again,
for policymakers interested in broadening the representation of the juror pool,
this finding is significant in that in this study, this group of jurors experience
more stress and, coincidentally, is vastly under-represented in the study’s
juror pool.
In larger courts, parking alone can swallow up the entire day’s worth of
juror compensation-as little as $9 a day (The Legal Intelligencer 1998, 9).
Even in jurisdictions where juror pay has increased to $40 per day, a fast food
lunch and transportation can easily erode a juror’s daily compensation. One of
the purposes of a shortened term of service is to permit persons to serve who
would have otherwise been excused for personal or community hardships.
Again, the certainty of service which the one-day/one-trial system affords
should also then provide for a better cross-section of the public serving on jury
duty and broader participation on the jury system generally. Implementation
of the one-day/one-trial policy does not automatically enhance
representation. However, we do know that the one-day/one-trial policy,
overall, reduces juror stress significantly. In a second progress report on jury
reform in New York State, authors of that report state that the reduction of
the length of jury service is the most effective means of reducing the burden
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 137
of jury duty. In the selected New York counties which had converted to the
one-day/one-trial term of service, average terms of service were reduced over
50% from 5.2 days to 2.5 days (New York State Unified Court System 1998, 7).
Policymakers might also consider the effects of economic hardships as
evidenced in this study’s finding that jurors experience more stress as their
rank on the occupation echelon diminishes. For part-time, retired,
unemployed, and homemaker jurors, it is logical to presume that on the whole,
this group would have limited annual incomes. Though their stress cannot be
accounted for by this factor alone, it is reasonable to consider that it may be
at least a contributing factor to their reported higher levels of stress.
In a study of juror characteristics in Bucks Count, Pennsylvania
(American Bar Association 1993, 73), a two-week term of service was compared
against the one-day/one-trial term of service over the years 1980-81. For the
occupation category, it was found that blue collar representation actually
decreased from 43 to 21 percent as the one-day/one-trial policy was
implemented, while homemaker, retired and student (and unemployed)
remained about the same in terms of representation. For policy researchers,
the question of whether one-day/one-trial policy increases representation for
persons not in the white collar class remains unanswered. From the findings
uncovered in this study, it is not known whether those not holding full time
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 138
positions are, in the least, more stressed as a group. This finding has public
policy implications as it emphasizes the need for more research into the ways
in which court reform policymakers might address the stress level for this
population of jurors while increasing their representation in the jury pool.
in a study of 1100 citizens who reported for service at a North Florida
urban court, researchers compared the responses of those who answered a
prior summons by reporting, excusing or postponing it, or by failing to appear.
Researchers then compared those whose attempts to excuse or postpone
current service were denied with people who reported without objections
(Losh, Wasserman, and Wasserman 2000). The authors reviewed the responses
of "failure to appears” (FTA’s) who intended to serve but whose appearance
was prohibited by practical obstacles and FTA’s who were insecure about their
ability to serve effectively. The authors concluded that, "...if FTA’s are
hostile, justice may be better served by leaving these recalcitrants alone.”
(Losh, Wasserman, and Wasserman 2000, 305). Even if policymakers reach
agreement with this conclusion, the question nonetheless remains as to why
certain elements of the citizenry remain proportionally under-represented.
While it is useful to assess how background factors relate to juror
stress, it is not within the parameters of this study to hypothesize why
respondents have answered affirmatively to their feelings of stress. With that
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. said, it is not known which groups and factors remain statistically significant
from the testing of the coefficients in this study. Jury research has primarily
focused on micro-level analyses which were primarily aimed at determining
which characteristics of the jury itself dictated the jury's verdict. Previous
scholarship has largely neglected the study of the macro-level constraints on
stress and jury service. Further, given the dearth of studies that devoted
research to the study of jurors from the classifications of unemployed, retired,
part-time, or homemaker, it is even more difficult to explain why this group of
jurors reported significantly more stress than those who held full-time
positions. The present findings should serve as the impetus for more specific
research into the specific remedies for which stress plays a role, perhaps
particularly for jurors classified from the ranks of the unemployed, part-time,
homemaker, and retired.
Job Type
We now focus upon the study’s final significant predictor variable: Job
Type. Reported juror occupational specialization categories were divided into
three broad categories which included managerial (40%), professional/
technical (46%), and service (mechanical labor) (14%). The T test for the
managerial class produced a strong significant score (T = -3.03, P < .05). For
jurors in this study who classified themselves from the ranks of the managerial
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. profession, stress measured at greatly reduced levels. Though the T test for
the professional/technical class did not approach statistical significance,
respondents in this class also scored slightly lower stress. Respondents in the
service profession class measured an increase in stress, though, again, for this
job type, the T test did not reach statistical significance (though it did
approach it (T = 1.67)). Generally speaking, as the job type moves from the
managerial to the professional/technical and into the service
(mechanical/laborer) group, stress increases for the jurors who served in this
study.
In postulating possible interpretations of this data, as with the previous
variable (self-employed, retired, students and part-time), few researchers
have focused upon the correlations between occupational groups and juror
stress. In a study that concentrated on social status in jury deliberations, the p authors note that occupational specialization registered two discernible
effects, "First, it increases productivity and, second, it provides the basis for a
status hierarchy” (Strodtbeck, James, and Hawkins 1957, 713). Since the
findings of that study were not intended to focus upon underlying reasons why
jurors from differing job types measured different stress levels, that study
cannot be drawn upon in the present analysis. The Strodtbeck et al. study did,
however, open the door to researching juries by discrete demographic
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 141
characteristics and this was an important departure from the focus of previous
jury research.
In a study of juror diversity (Schreckhise and Sheldon 1998), the
authors studied collected demographic data from potential jurors and found
that their study's statistical occupational distributions, when compared with
the 1990 census data, were closely matched. The demographic data were
coded differently than in the present study, but showed that 66% of the
studied juror panels (in 1995) were composed of what they termed as white
collar or professional occupations, while 26% were classified as blue collar, and
8% fell into the manual labor category. According to the authors, the
occupational structure closely matched the counties in which the data were
collected, except in the case of the laborer group which was under
represented by 6%. In this study, the four job types’ distribution, when
compared with Schreckhise and Sheldon’s reference to 1990 census data, do
appear to approach representative levels.51
In fielding potential explanations as to why jurors classified in the
managerial ranks reported significantly less stress than their counterparts in
the professional/tech and service fields, it may be useful to refer back to the
Service model (page 106) for potential indications. Recall that for all of the
51Schreckhise and Sheldon report that individuals in their samples that were employed in professional occupations exceeded that of the general population.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 142
significant explanatory variables, stress was assessed from various events
related to having to perform jury service. Of the several stress variables
incorporated into the model, two would appear to have reasonable import in
defining stress for occupational types: the first was "disruption to your daily
/ routine”; the second was "limits on your actions during jury service.” Though
all of the model's variables are important in determining the T scores for all
significant findings, one could suggest that jurors in the managerial profession
may reasonably be less stressed in that their daily routines are generally
structured and in most cases, their employment security would not normally be
threatened by jury duty service. Those jurors in the managerial professions
are more likely to have support from employers who would be willing to ensure
the wages of the employee. In addition, those representing the managerial
ranks would, on the whole, Gommand higher incomes than those in the
professional/technical field, or certainly than those jurors employed in
service/manual labor fields. In a recent study performed by John Ryan, it was
noted that more than 50 % of employees earning under $40,000 annually would
not be paid their wages during jury service (Ryan 1999, 462).
While those jurors employed in manual labor fields may be allowed by
the reporting court to use their idle courthouse time to plug in their laptop
computers, it is much more likely that those in the managerial ranks would
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 143
have a need or would seek to take advantage of that opportunity for the
jurisdictions that allow such accommodations. Disruptions to daily routines, at
least for those who have an option to minimize their disorder while called to
jury service, would logically be far more stressed than those who are destined
to make little use of idle time while called into service. Professionals or
managers may worry that service would interfere with their jobs, but members
of these educational or occupational groups often find ways to communicate
with their offices; through cell phones, computers, and other technological
tools, they are more likely to limit their disruptions while in jury service.
For those jurors representing the manual labor ranks, the entire jury
experience is almost guaranteed to disrupt daily routines. With little to
accomplish during the frequent periods of down-time, it is reasonable to
suggest that the convergence of discussed factors would result in greater levels
of stress. For jurors in the professional/technical or manual labor fields, jury
service presents greater obstacles to their normal daily activities, and for
many who also surrender their daily paychecks and job responsibilities, jury
service can become an even more stressful affair.
Other factors, when added to the issues discussed above would further
intensify stress levels for non-managerial jurors. Public transit systems may be
poor; jury service may conflict with school or childcare; and long jury service
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 144
could endanger jobs. For those who are single, or unmarried (or with
children), such obstacles would further intensify stress levels.
As with the previous predictor variables, it is not possible to suggest
that significant stress factors can be fully or adequately explained given the
limits of this study design. However, in exploring reasonable explanations for
the significant coefficient T test stress scores, I hope to have developed an
important basis for further research into the causes of juror stress within the
parameters of study design demographic categories. Continued research into
juror stress could serve to improve our jury system. There are, unfortunately,
extraordinarily few studies which have delved into this unique topic of
research-though I am confident that judicial policymakers and researchers will
be well served by this work and will consider it a useful stepping stone for
further juror stress studies.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. CHAPTER VI
Summary
The analysis performed in this study substantiated the hypothesis that
for the study population, jurors serving in one-day/one-trial jurisdictions
experience significantly less overall stress than their counterparts who served
in non-one-day/one-trial courts (T = -3.91, P < .001). The analysis also
indicates that of the several predictor variables that were tested, four Service
model variables attained statistical significance as either measuring substantial
increases or decreases in juror stress. After running regression analyses for
each of the several predictor variables, coefficient relationships were detailed
which demonstrated that high school (T = -3.24, P < .01), self-employed/part
time (T = 2.15, P < .05), marginal income (T = -3.03, P < .01), and managerial
occupation (T = -2.41, P < .05) all exceeded statistical significance from the P
= < .05 through the P = < .01 levels.
Other variables run in the regression analysis included age, gender,
race, relationship status, college, fulltime, number of children,
professional/technical, service, number of hours in deliberations, and number
of jurors serving on panel. For these variables, no meaningful significance
145
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 146
levels were reached, though all of the variables did test for some level of
measured stress either in a positive or negative direction.
The analysis points out that beyond the major finding, which affirms
that study population jurors from one-day/one*trial jurisdictions are, overall,
significantly less stressed than their counterparts in non*one*day/one-trial
jurisdictions, some predictor variables which tested significant may be of
particular interest to judicial policymakers.
In the original study design, levels of stress to survey questions were
measured by the Likert scale which recorded juror responses from no stress to
highest stress. In this study, I have further analyzed survey responses by a host
of demographic classifications. My intent, in part, was to further define the
sphere of juror stress research by carefully chosen demographic
characteristics, thereby advancing the breadth of knowledge that currently
exists in this area of study.
In view of the current dearth of literature on the topic of juror stress
research, I can find no other study design that endeavors to examine the
one-day/one-trial policy in terms of its effect upon juror stress. Though the
topic of juror stress is a relatively recent concern to judicial policymakers,
much of the current literature has been devoted to examining concrete, but
perhaps limited, responses to the phenomenon. A number of studies have
4 •->
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 147
addressed peripheral analyses, for instance, in looking at juror demographics
of non-response jurors and in understanding the anatomy of economic excuses
in different racial groups. In defining juror stress by demographic variables
and in further refining juror stress by the presence or absence of the
one-day /one-trial policy, there are now new avenues of research that court
policymakers can draw upon.
The present analysis suggests various plausible explanations for the
findings. Given the structure and limitations of the original study design,
analysis and interpretation of the study’s findings was limited to rational and
grounded input from a survey of field research and current court reform
literature. Had the original study design been structured to capture more
detailed information regarding individual jurors’ elaboration on specific
suggestions for reducing stress, the findings would have been enriched
significantly.
This study sheds light on the subject of juror stress. The dilemma of
juror stress as it is now comprehended; it should be of critical importance to
judicial planners who will be seeking strategies to reduce it. In recognizing
and accommodating jurors from specific demographic categories, judicial
planners have had to muddle through a confusing maze of remedies. Many
courts have addressed the more simplistic and easily understood remedies
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. which have largely focused around accommodating jurors’ difficulties with
juror service process, or the issues concerned with their actual performance of
jury duty. Examples of reforms which come to mind that are aimed at
addressing the process issue include taking notes and asking questions during
trial, plain language statutes, allowing jurors to discuss evidence among
themselves during the trial, mini opening statements, pre-instruction, limits on
peremptory challenges, strengthening protections against disclosure of jurors’
names and addresses in criminal trials (when necessary), eliminating the
distinction between trial and alternate jurors, broadening the use of databases
(including unemployment and welfare rolls and income tax mailing lists),
seeking feedback of jurors through surveys/questionnaires, and providing
longer periods of disqualification from future jury service to jurors who have
served for a lengthy periods. This list is not exhaustive, but offers remedies
aimed at addressing iurv service issues or concerns that jurors may have with
regard to their having to perform jury service.
Many courts have instituted service measure reforms which are aimed
at easing the burden of jury service. They differ substantially from
fundamental process reforms in that service related reforms tend to address
threshold jury duty issues such as increasing juror compensation, court-assisted
child care accommodations, individual counseling for jurors involved in
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 149
stressful trials, the use of juror orientation videos, one-day/one-trial (insuring
certainty of reduced service time), postponement of jury service (by
telephone), telephone call-in systems, enhancement of juror facilities
(including computer carrels), judicial pre-screening of jury arrays in criminal
cases to identify those jurors who are obviously excusable for cause, speeding
the process of selecting jurors by authorizing Judicial Hearing Officers to
preside over jury selection in civil cases, and the like.
The empirical findings of this study should be of use to researchers
interested in obtaining more detailed remedies for the causes of juror stress.
The relationships connecting juror stress to specific demographic categories in
this study should also provide future researchers additional tools in examining
better defined root causes of both of process and service stress issues. More
importantly, this study now represents a base for enlightening judicial
policymakers as to important insights into the newly emerging but important
subject of juror stress.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. APPENDIX A
ORIGINAL STUDY DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY
150
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 151
INTRODUCTION AND STUDY OBJECTIVES
The purposes of this study were (1) to examine the prevalence of juror stress, both in its actual manifestation in selected trials across the country and in judicial perceptions of its prevalence, (2) to identify sources of juror stress, and (3) to develop effective strategies that court officials can apply to help alleviate stress among jurors. Specifically, this study improves upon the methodologies of previous studies by developing a more comprehensive and systematic database on juror stress; determining applicable base-line stress levels; identifying specific stressors and stress mediators, as well as indicators and predictors of susceptibility to juror stress; and comparing the perceptions of juror stress held by various participants in the legal process other than the jurors themselves (e.g., judges, court personnel). The sources of juror stress identified and the strategies recommended are based on extensive surveys of judges and jurors as well as a series of interviews conducted during site visits to state courts across the country.
METHODOLOGY
To accomplish the study objectives, project staff used a combination of survey and field research methodologies. Judges from across the country were surveyed to learn more about their perceptions of the prevalence of juror stress and about their strategies for alleviating or responding to stress. The nationwide mail survey of state trial judges consisted of an initial, short questionnaire to a random sample of judges and an additional, five-page questionnaire to judges who completed the first questionnaire and indicated a willingness to respond to the more detailed follow-up questionnaire. Project staff also interviewed judges, court personnel, and jurors in six courts across the country. The interviews explored the causes of juror stress in greater detail and solicited ideas for responding to manifestations of stress among jurors. Representing geographically diverse state trial courts of varying docket sizes and jurisdictional case types, the six courts that participated as research sites were:
• Superior Court of Orange County, California (Santa Ana) • First Judicial District of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia) • Second Judicial District of Minnesota (St. Paul) • Fourth Judicial District of Minnesota (Minneapolis) • Circuit Court of the 20th Judicial District of Tennessee (Nashville) • Superior Court of Maricopa County, Arizona (Phoenix)
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 152
In addition, project staff collected questionnaire packets from individuals in each of the six courts who served as jurors, alternate jurors, or unassigned members of the jury panel. The packet consisted of three questionnaires addressing the individual’s jury experience, two questionnaires addressing possible stress symptoms, and one page of demographic questions. A similar follow-up packet consisting of two questionnaires was sent to these individuals six to eight weeks later.52 Finally, with the assistance of a clinical psychologist, project staff conducted post-trial jury debriefings53 with several juries, at both the research sites and two additional sites (Montgomery County and Prince George’s County, Maryland).54 These debriefings provided more insight into the nature of juror stress and its implications for jurors.
SAMPLE
Judges. Surveys were mailed to 842 judges. Of the surveys returned, 57 were excluded from the final sample because 10 respondents were retired, 9 surveys were sent back undeliverable, 3 judges were deceased, and 35 judges did not preside over trials during 1994. The final sample included 441 of the 785 eligible respondents, representing a 59 percent response rate. The sample included respondents from every state except Rhode Island. Respondents included 54 female judges and 373 male judges (14 of the respondents did not identify their gender). Of these initial respondents, approximately 200 agreed to fill out a longer survey and 118 completed and returned the follow-up questionnaire. Jurors. Questionnaire packets were returned from 401 individuals serving as jurors or alternates. In addition, staff collected similar questionnaire data from approximately 453 unassigned members of the jury
52During the project, questionnaires also were distributed to a jury in a death penalty case in Howard County, Maryland. Howard and Baltimore Counties were involved in a preliminary study on juror stress before the current study began.
“ Jury debriefings are short group sessions in which the jurors have an opportunity to explore and better understand their emotional reaction to the trial and to jury service. The debriefers typically describe symptoms associated with juror stress and make recommendations to the jurors about appropriate stress management techniques.
"Questionnaire packets also were distributed to the jurors participating in the debriefing in Montgomery County.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 153
panel. These unassigned members consisted of individuals who actually participated in a voir dire and individuals who were never called. It was not possible to calculate an exact juror response rate.55 Of the 401 jurors/alternates, 114 completed and returned a second questionnaire packet six to eight weeks following their jury duty experience. The 401 jurors from the field sites participated in a wide range of cases. Nearly 60 percent sat on juries for criminal cases involving charges such as robbery, assault, rape, murder, manslaughter, and drunk driving. Of this 60 percent, 16 percent (N=37) participated on a death penalty case in which they had to decide the sentence. The remaining 40 percent of jurors sat on civil cases consisting primarily of tort cases involving malpractice and personal injury.56
INSTRUMENTS
Judges. The initial judges’ survey, Questionnaire for Judges on Juror Stress (QJJS), was one page in length and consisted of 12 items. The data obtained from this survey included the number of jury trials the judge presided over, the number of jurors involved in the trials, the existence of juror stress, possible sources of juror stress, and strategies employed by the judges to prevent, address, or minimize juror stress. The longer follow-up survey was designed to generate information that would provide a more in-depth picture of judicial perceptions about the prevalence, sources, and effects of juror stress. To assess judicial perceptions of juror stress, the survey provided a list of 49 possible sources. This comprehensive list was derived from the prior work of the researchers and modified by responses to an open-ended question of the same nature included in the initial QJJS survey. Responding judges were asked to rate the stressfulness of each item for their jurors in general on a five-point, Likert- type scale from 0 = "not at all stressful” to 4 = "extremely stressful.” In
"Project staff distributed some questionnaires during site visits. To obtain a larger sample, staff supplied court personnel with additional questionnaires to be distributed to jurors at the completion of a trial. Although the questionnaires were numbered, they were not distributed from boxes in a sequential manner, and staff were unable to retrieve the undistributed questionnaires. As a result, it is not known how many packets were actually distributed; thus a response rate cannot be calculated.
"Nine of the jurors did not indicate whether they sat on a civil or criminal trial.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 154
addition, they were asked to list in order the five sources that most often cause stress in their jurors. Finally, to determine the strategies used by judges to manage juror stress, the frequency of their use, and their perceived effectiveness, the survey provided a list of 42 possible stress reduction strategies. This comprehensive list also was derived from the prior work of the researchers and modified by responses to an open-ended question of the same nature included in the initial QJJS survey. Again, judges were asked to indicate which strategies they employ to prevent, address, or minimize juror stress and to rate their effectiveness on a five-point, Likert-type scale from 0 = "not effective” to 4 = "extremely effective.” Jurors. As mentioned earlier, questionnaire packets were distributed to jurors, alternate jurors, and unassigned members of the jury panel. These packets consisted of a demographic information sheet and the following three questionnaires: Jury Duty Survey, Jury Environment Scale, and Jury Stress Scale. In addition, the SCL-90-Jt Symptom Checklist and Eysenck Personality Inventory were admfniSfcgr®^ The SCL-90-R scale, a 90-item symptom checklist,37 was included to assess specific aspects of psychological stress. Also, the Eysenck Personality Inventory (Form A)3* was included to assess prominent personality dimensions and was intended to determine if certain types of individuals were more likely than others to manifest symptoms of stress while serving on a jury.39 The follow-up packet consisted of the Jury Duty Survey and SCL-90-R Symptom Checklist. The Jury Duty Survey was adapted from a general scale60 for assessing responses to trauma but in this case was targeted towards jury duty in
97See Leonard R. Derogatis, Hopkins Symptom Check List, 1990-Revised (1993).
"H.J. Eysenck and Sybil B.G. Eysenck, Eysenck Personality Inventory, Form A (1963).
"Results of the SCL-90-R indicated that the great majority of jurors exhibited stress levels commensurate with those exhibited in the general population. Only jurors participating on death penalty cases had elevated levels of symptomology compared with the general population, and follow-up assessments indicated that these jurors’ symptoms returned to normal within six to eight weeks. Because most jurors did not experience clinical levels of psychological distress, analyses of the Eysenck Personality Inventory were not conducted.
"See Mardi Horowitz et al., Impact of event scale: A measure of subjective stress, 41 Psychosomatic Med. 209 (1979).
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 155
particular. This scale was developed by the research team and included 20 "yes or noM items focusing on personal jury duty experiences and their associated stressfulness. The items in this survey describe symptoms that the juror might have experienced (e.g., "I am more tense than I was before jury duty”). The Jury Environment Scale was adapted for use with jurors from sub scales of the Work Environment Scale and the Group Environment Scale.61 Specifically, the Jury Environment Scale consists of 45 true or false items. Each of the items focuses on certain aspects of jury duty, including general impressions and interactions with the judge, court officials, and fellow jurors.62 The Jury Duty Stress Scale measures the stress of specific aspects and tasks associated with a trial and jury duty. The research team constructed this instrument and pilot tested it with juries in two high-profile trials. The questionnaire consists of 50 items ranging from 0 = "not at all stressful” to 4 = "extremely stressful.” Examples of items on the scale include "receiving summons,” "media coverage of the trial,” "presentation of disturbing/grisly evidence,” "jury deliberations,” and "sentencing of the defendant” (see Appendix C for all of the items).
61The scales were adapted with permission from the author, Rudolph M. Moos, and the publisher, Consulting Psy&wlogists Press.
62These scales should be interpreted on a jury-by-jury basis. Because the data were not coded by jury, these analyses were not conducted.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. APPENDIX B
BACKGROUND INFORMATION QUESTIONNAIRE
156
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 157
Age: Sex: ______(in years) (M or F) Race: __ African American/Black Native American Asian or Pacific Islands Caucasian/White __ Hispanic Other ______Education: less than fours years of high school __ college graduate fours years of high school (or GEO) only __ graduate school some college or technical/vocational training Marital Status: __ Married __ Widowed______Separated Single __ Divorced Cohabitating Number of Children: Total Number:____ Living With You:____ What is your occupation? Managerial Speciality (e.g., financial, personnel, public relations, advertising) Professional (e.g., teacher, doctor, lawyer, writer) Technical and Sales (e.g., sales, clerical, computer operators, technicians) Service (e.g., police, fireman, waitress, beautician, household worker, homemaker) Agricultural (e.g., farmers, operators and managers) Mechanic/Craftsman Equipment Operators, Laborers, Transportation Workers Other (Specify)______Job Status: Employed full time Student Self-Employed Homemaker __ Employed part time __ Retired __ Unemployed What was your approximate household income last year? __ under $10,000 ___$10,000-519,999 ___ $20,000-$29,999 __ $30,000-539,999 ___$40,000-$49,999 __ $50,000-$59,999 __ $60,000-$100,000 __ more than $100,000
1. How many jurors served on your jury (not including alternates)?___ 2. How long did the trial last (in days)?____ 3. How long did the deliberations last (in hours)? 4. Was your jury required to reach a unanimous verdict? Yes No Was vour iurv able to reach a verdict? Yes No Did vour iurv reach a unanimous verdict? Yes No If so. what was the verdict? 5. What type of trial was this: __ Criminal (where a defendant is charged with a crime) __ Civil (where two or more parties are involved in a non-criminal trial) 6. Briefly describe the trial.
7. Were you required to recommend a sentence/damages? Yes . No 8. What was the most severe sentence/or htehest damaoes souaht? What sentence/damages did your jury give (if any)? ...... 9. Briefly describe any noteworthy event(s) or evidence at the trial.
10. Were court officials helpful? ___ Yes ____ No 11. Was the judge helpful?____Yes ____ No 12. Were you experiencing high levels of stress before jury duty?___ Yes ____ No
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. APPENDIX C
JURY DUTY STRESS SCALE
158
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 159
For the following aspects of jury duty, circle the number to the right that best describes how much stress each of these items has caused you during your jury duty. Circle only one number for each item, or NA if the item is Hot Applicable, that is, did not occur during your jury duty.
Not Applicable Not At All A Little Bit Moderately Quite a Bit Extremely NA 0 1 2 3 4
(1) Receiving the Summons to Jury Duty NA 0 (2) Reporting for Jury Duty NA 0 (3) Waiting for Assignment to a Trial NA 0 (4) Jury Selection (i.e ., choosing a jury) NA 0 (5) Answering Questions in Front of Other People NA 0 (6) Talking to the Judge NA 0 (7) Talking to the Attorneys NA 0 (8) Juror Pay and Compensation NA 0 (9) Disruptions to Daily Routine NA 0 (10) Pre-existing Medical or Psychological Problems NA 0
(11) Troubles at Home or Work During Jury Duty NA 0 (12) Limits on Actions During Jury Duty NA 0 (13) Media Coverage of Jury Selection NA 0 (14) Cameras in the Courtroom NA 0 (15) Being Publicly Identified as a Juror NA 0 (16) Fear of Reprisal/Concerns for Personal Safety NA 0 (17) Characteristics of the Criminal Defendant NA 0 (18) Characteristics of the Parties (Civil Suit) NA 0 (19) Characteristics of the Victims (if any) NA 0 (20) Interactions with Court Officials (e.g., acted rude) NA 0 (21) Description of Crime Against a Child NA 0 (22) Description of a Sexual Crime NA 0 (23) Description of a Violent Crime NA 0 (24) Issues/Evidence with a Personal Impact/Meaning NA 0 (25) Description of Disturbing/Grisly Events NA 0
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. (26) Description of the Upcoming Trial NA 0
(27) Description of Jury Duty NA 0
(28) Long Jury Selection NA 0 (29) Boring Jury Selection NA 0
(30) The Adversarial System (our present system where NA 0 two sides, pitted against each other, take turns asking questions and presenting their best case)
(31) Attorneys’ Behavior During Jury Selection NA 0 (32) Interruptions/Delays During Jury Selection NA 0 (33) Side Bars/Discussions Outside Hearing of Jurors NA 0
(34) Objections/Arguments by Attorneys NA 0 (35) Condition of the Jury Assembly Room NA 0 (36) Condition of the Court Room NA 0 (37) Judge’s Instructions NA 0 (38) Dissension/Differences Among Jurors NA 0
(39) Ban on Discussing Case with Jurors NA 0
(40) Ban on Discussing Case with Family/Friends NA 0
(41) Fear of Making a Mistake NA 0
(42) Prospect of Deciding on a Verdict NA 0
(43) Prospect of Jury Deliberations and Discussions NA 0
(44) Prospect of Sentencing a Criminal Defendant NA 0
(45) Prospect of Sequestration (i.e ., when the judge NA 0 orders the jury isolated from outside contacts) (46) Concerns about Community Reactions NA 0 (47) Prospect of Giving Death Penalty (if applies) NA 0
(48) Others (please identify, explain below) NA 0
NA 0 NA 0 NA 0 NA 0
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. BIBLIOGRAPHY
Abt Associates, Inc. 1977. An Exemplary Project: One Dav/One Trial Jury System. Wayne County, Ml, July, 1-196.
Abraham, Henry J. 1980. The Judicial Process: An Introductory Analysis of the Courts of the United States. England, and France. New York: Oxford University Press.
Abramson, Jeffrey. 1994. We. the Jurv: The Jury System and the Ideal of Democracy. New York: Harper.
Adler, Stephen J. 1994. The Jurv: Trial and Error in the American Courtroom. New York: Random House.
American Bar Association Division for Media Relations and Public Affairs. 1998. Perceptions of the U.S. Justice System. Chicago, 3.
American Bar Association Judicial Administration Division Committee on Jury Standards. 1993. Standards Relating to Juror Use and Management. Chicago, 73.
Blackburn, Robert (General Editor) and Institute for Public Policy Research. 1993. A Written Constitution for the United Kingdom. London: Mansell Publishing Limited.
Boatright, Robert. 2000. Generations, Age Groups, and Jury Service. American Judicature Society. Chicago. January. 1-18. Published under a grant from the State Justice Institute (#SJI-00-N-115).
Boatright, Robert. 1999. Why citizens don’t respond to jury summonses and what courts can do about it. Judicature 82(4): 156-164.
Canadian Judicial Council/Carl Baar. 1991. Possibilities and Limitations. St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada, November, 1-127.
161
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 162
Carleton, Guy. 1900. Historical Jurisprudence: An Introduction to the Systematic Study of the Development of Law. New York: Macmillan 8t Co.
Center for Jury Studies. 1979. One-Dav/One-Trial Experience in Colorado Springs. El Paso Countv. Colorado. McLean, VA, August, 1-11.
Council for Court Excellence. 1996. Juries for the Year 2000 and Bevond: Proposals to Improve the Jury System in Washington. D.C. Washington, D.C., September, 1-112.
Cross, Rupert and Harris, J.W. 1991. Precedent in English Law. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Curriden, Mark. 1995. Jury reform: no one agrees on whether the system is broken, but everyone is to change it. American Bar Association Journal. November, 72-76.
Davidowitz, Esther. 1994. The hidden perils of jury duty. Psychological effects of jury duty. Redbook 182: 80-86.
Dean, David. 1996. Law-Making and Society in Late Elizabethan England: The Parliament of England. 1584-1601. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
DeAngelis, Tori. 1995. American Psychological Association, June http://www.apa.org/monitor/jun95/juryb.html, 1 -3.
Druff, James M. 1985. The cross-section requirement and jury impartiality. California Law Review73: 1555-1585.
Eysenck, H.J. and Eysenck, Sybil B. G.1963. Eysenck Personality Inventory. Form A.
Feldmann, Theodore B., M.D. 1999. Press Release April 16. Louisville, KY: Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences, University of Louisville School of Medicine. Retrieved date April 2000. (http://members.aol.com/robodoc7/index.html).
Fisher, H.R. 1973. The seventh amendment and the common law: No magic in
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 163
numbers. Federal Rules Decisions 56: 442-507.
Floyd, Doug. 1999. Jury service part of a citizen’s duty. The Spokesman Review. Spokane County, WA. November 11,8.
Fukurai, Hiroshi and Edgar W. Butler. 1991. Organization, labor force, and jury representation: economic excuses and jury participation. Jurimetrics Journal 31: 61.
Fukarai, Hiroshi. 1996. Race, social class, and jury participation: New dimensions for evaluating discrimination in jury service and jury selection. Journal of Criminal Justice 24111: 71-88.
Gobert, James. 1997. Justice. Democracy, and the Jury. Aldershot, England: Dartmouth Publishing Company Ltd.
Haddon, Phoebe A. 1994. Rethinking the Jury. William ft Marv Bill of Rights Journal. Publications Council of the College of William and Mary: Williamsburg, VA. Summer: 29-106.
Halbert, Marvin R. 1998. Special to the Legal. The Legal Intelligencer February 9: 9.
Hans, Valerie and Vidmar, Neil. 1986. Judging the Jury. New York: Plenum Press.
Hastie, Reid, Penrod, Steven D. and Pennington, Nancy. 1983. Inside the Jury. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.
Heyderbrand, Wolf and Seron, Carroll. 1990. Rationalizing Justice: The Political Economy of Federal District Courts. Albany: State University of New York Press.
Higginbotham, Patrick. 1977. Continuing the dialogue: civil juries and the allocation of power. Texas Law Review (56) 47(1): 47-60.
Horowitz, Mardi et al. 1979. Impact of event scale: a measure of subjective stress. Psychosomatic Med. 41: 209.
Hyman, Harold M. and Tarrant, Catherine M. 1975. Aspects of American Trial
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 164
jury history, pp. 21-44 in The Jury System in America, edited by Rita J. Simon. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage Publications.
Institute for Court Management Court Executive Development Program Phase III Project. 1998. A Feasibility Study of a One Dav/One Trial Jury Service in Kent Countv Michigan. Kent County, Ml, May, 1-30.
Jerome, Frank. 1973. Courts On Trial: Mvth and Reality in American Justice. Princeton, NJ: Princeton Press.
Kassin Saul M., Wrightsman Lawrence S. 1988. The American Jury on Trial: Psychological Perspectives. New York, NY: Hemisphere Publishing Corporation.
Kalven, Harry Jr. and Zeisel, Hans. [1966] 1986. The American Jury, Reprinted, Chicago: Midway.
Levine, James P. 1996. "The Impact of Sequestration on Juries.” Judicature. (79) 5 March-April, pp. 266-272.
Lloyd, Jillian. 1998. "Big Trials Change Juror Lives”. The Christian Science Monitor January 14, p.1.
Los Angeles Times. 1998. "An In Depth Look at People and Policies Shaping Los Angeles County; Courthouse Deliberations; Being selected For Jury Duty Can Be Something of an Adventure-or an Endurance Test”. May 15: P.2.
Losh, Susan Carol, Adina W. Wasserman, Michael A. Wasserman. 2000. "Reluctant Jurors: How Responses to a Summons Relate to Attitudes Toward Jury Duty.” Judicature. 83. May/June. pp. 304-310.
Martin, Donald L. 1972. "The Economics of Jury Conscription,” The Journal of Political Economy, Volume 80, Issue 4 July/August pp. 680-702.
Minow, Martha. 1987. "Interpreting Rights: An Essay for Robert Cover.” Yale Law Journal. (96). pp. 1860-1915.
Morris, M.F. 1911. The History of the Development of Law. Washington, DC: John Byre & Co.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Munsterman, G. Thomas. 1986. Reduced Terms of Jury Service in the Federal Courts. Williamsburg, VA: National Center for State Courts.
Myers, Robert D., and Griller, Gordon, M. 1977. "Educating Jurors Means Better Trials: Jury Reform in Arizona." The Judges' Journal. (13) Fall, pp. 13-52.
National Center for State Courts. 1994. Report on Trends in the State Courts. Williamsburg VA: National Center for State Courts, P. 19.
______. 1998. Through the Eyes of the Juror: A Manual for Addressing Juror Stress. Williamsburg VA: National Center for State Courts, 1-90.
______. May 1999. How the Public Views The State Courts. Williamsburg, VA: National Center for State Courts, Hearst Corporation grant. P. 7.
National Center for State Courts Center for Jury Studies, Western Regional Office. 1985. "Proposed One Trial/One Day Jury System for the Courts Serving Maricopa County, Arizona”, Maricopa County, AZ, March, 1-7.
New York State Unified Court System. 1998 "Jury Reform in New York State: A Second Progress Report on a Continuing Initiative.", New York, NY, March. 1-22.
Nordgren J. Chris, and Thelen Mathew W. 1999. "Helping Jurors Manage Stress: A Multilevel Approach.” Judicature. (82) 6, May-June. pp. 256-262.
O’Neill Ann W., Abram, Susan, McAllister, Sue, Blankenstein, Andrew, et al. 1998. "An in-depth look at people and policies shaping Los Angeles County; Courthouse Deliberations." Los Angeles Times. June 15, pp. B2.
Ryan, John Paul. 1999. "The American Trial Jury: Current Issues and Controversies”. National Council for the Social Studies. Nov/Dec, Vol. 63, Issue 7. p. 458-461.
Roan, Shari. 1995. "The Verdict: Simpson Jurors will be Case Study in Dealing with Stress” in The Detroit News, September 29, pp. 1-2.
Schreckhise, William D., and Charles H. Sheldon, "The Search for Greater Juror
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 166
Diversity: The Case of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Washington.” The Justice System Journal. Volume 20, Number 1. PP. 96-110.
Scott, A.P. 1930. Criminal Law-in .Colonial Virginia. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Singleton, Royce Jr. et al. 1988. Approaches to Social Research. New York: Oxford University Press.
Simon, Rita. J. 1967. The Jury and the Defense of Insanity, Boston: Little, Brown.
______1975. The Jury System in America: A Critical Overview. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage Publications.
______1980. The Jury: It’s Role in American Society. Lexington, MA: Lexington Books.
Simpson, A.W.B. 1987. Legal Theory and Legal History: Essays on the Common Law. London, England: The Hambledon Press.
Stephan, C. 1967. "Selective Characteristics of Jurors and Litigants: Their Influences on Juries’ verdicts.” pp. 95-121 in The Jury System in America: A Critical Overview, edited by R. J. Simon. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage Publications.
Solomon, Chris. 1999. Ex-juror says she will sue over stress, The Seattle Times, King County Washington, September 4, pp. 6.
Sowa, Tom. 1999. Judicial News, Publication of the Washington State Office of the Administrator for the Courts. December 6, pp.6.
St. Louis Post-Dispatch. 1995 "Experts Ponder Pressure, Stress Imposed on Jurors.” September 9, pp. 1A.
Strodtbeck, Fred L., Rita M. James, and Charles Hawkins. 1957. "Social Status in Jury Deliberations.” American Sociological Review. Volume 22, Issue 6 December. P. 713-719.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 167
Trial Court Programs Division Office of the State Court Administrator Oregon Judicial Department. 1997. "An Evaluation of the Marion County Court One-Trial/One-Day Term”, Marion County, OR, February.
The United States Law Week. 1998. "Courts and Procedure-Juries.” March 3, P.1.
Wasserman, Elizabeth. 1994. "Stress Takes its Toll on Members of the Jury.” Newsday. January 10, pp. 6.
Wolfram, Charles. 1973. "The Constitutional History of the Seventh Amendment." Minnesota Law Review. (57) pp.639-747.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.