Generational and age-based differences in attitudes towards jury service.

Abstract

Analysis of surveys of jurors, potential jurors, and the general public show significant differences in attitudes towards jury service by the age of the respondent. This study analyzes the degree to which these differences are the result of generational effects, in which younger citizens are likely to continue in their beliefs about jury service as they age, and the degree to which they are a result of a respondent's life circumstances-income, employment status, or family status-and are thus not likely to be carried with jurors as they age. The article shows that, while there are differences in confidence in the courts by age group, younger jurors are more confident in their own abilities to serve well as jurors but more skeptical of the court as a whole; most differences in attitudes towards jury service are linked to life-cycle phenomena. As such, courts should work to provide assistance to particular age groups within the jury pool, including child care and appropriate compensation, if they are to attract jurors who are representative by age of the general public.