Guilt Ratings Research Articles

Judicial instructions on alibis: impact on mock jury decision-making

Cloud Research (N = 320) participants read a hypothetical description of an arson and police investigation. They were randomly assigned to one of eight conditions in a 2 (presence of alibi evidence) X 2 (presence of prosecution evidence) X 2 (presence of judicial alibi instructions) between-participants design. They completed alibi believability ratings, chose a verdict and evaluated the defendant’s character. Alibis were more believable in the absence of incriminating prosecution evidence and the presence of exonerating alibi evidence. Alibi evidence also led to more positive views of the defendant. The presence of judicial instructions decreased likelihood of guilt ratings. Most participants chose a not guilty verdict, yet guilty verdicts were more common when prosecution evidence was present. Scalar verdict-confidence ratings were higher when prosecution evidence was present and alibi evidence was absent. While participant recall on the judge’s instructions were poor, they performed well on two recognition questions.

The Interpersonal Guilt Rating Scale 15 Item Self-Report Version (IGRS-15s): Exploring the Factor Structure and Psychometric Properties in a Sample of American Post 9/11 Active-Duty and Veteran Military Personnel

The Interpersonal Guilt Rating Scale 15 Item Self-Report Version (IGRS-15s): Exploring the Factor Structure and Psychometric Properties in a Sample of American Post 9/11 Active-Duty and Veteran Military Personnel

The impact of misinformation presented during jury deliberation on juror memory and decision-making.

When deliberating, jurors may introduce misinformation that may influence other jurors' memory and decision-making. In two studies, we explored the impact of misinformation exposure during jury deliberation. Participants in both studies read a transcript of an alleged sexual assault. In Study 1 (N = 275), participants encountered either consistent pro-prosecution misinformation, consistent pro-defense misinformation, or contradictory misinformation (pro-prosecution and pro-defense). In Study 2 (N = 339), prior to encountering either pro-prosecution or pro-defense misinformation while reading a jury deliberation transcript, participants either received or did not receive a judicial instruction about misinformation exposure during deliberation. Participants in both studies completed legal decision-making variables (e.g., defendant guilt rating) before and after deliberation, and their memory was assessed for misinformation acceptance via recall and source memory tasks. In Study 1, misinformation type did not influence legal decision-making, but pro-prosecution misinformation was more likely to be misattributed as trial evidence than pro-defense or contradictory misinformation. In Study 2, pro-defense misinformation was more likely to be misattributed to the trial than pro-prosecution misinformation, and rape myths moderated this. Furthermore, exposure to pro-defense misinformation skewed legal decision-making towards the defense's case. However, the judicial instruction about misinformation exposure did not influence memory or decision-making. Together, these findings suggest that misinformation in jury deliberations may distort memory for trial evidence and bias decision-making, highlighting the need to develop effective safeguards for reducing the impact of misinformation in trial contexts.

Assessing Burdening Guilt and Its Correlates.

Burdening guilt refers to the belief that one's emotions, needs, and ways of being are a burden to others, and is one type of interpersonal guilt proposed by the control-mastery theory (CMT). The aim of this article is to validate two new measures of burdening guilt. In the two studies conducted, we examined the psychometric properties of these scales and the relationship between burdening guilt and self-perceived burden (burdensomeness), self-esteem, shame, anxiety, depression, mental health, attachment insecurity, adverse childhood experiences, social desirability, empathy, and suicidal ideation. In Study 1, we presented a newly developed Burdening Guilt Rating Scale (BGRS) and its correlation with measures of the abovementioned dimensions. In Study 2 we verified, through confirmatory factor analysis and correlation techniques, the possibility of expanding the Interpersonal Guilt Rating Scale-15 with a shorter, 5-item burdening guilt scale derived from the BGRS, and showed that this shorter scale correlates similarly to the longer one. Findings allowed us to validate these new scales providing empirical measures of burdening guilt-a theoretical concept with important clinical implications.

Vicious Relational Circles and Chronic Couple Conflictuality: An Empirical Study

The study aims to empirically assess the control-mastery theory hypothesis that considers chronic couple conflictuality as the repetition of relational vicious circles—that is, interactions where both partners test their pathogenic beliefs and fail their reciprocal tests, confirming their reciprocal pathogenic beliefs. In addition, the study aims to verify if interpersonal guilt is more activated during couple conflicts. Our study involved 11 couples treated by four experienced therapists and nine trained, independent judges who, after reading verbatim transcripts of the couples’ psychotherapy sessions, used the Patient Scale of Couple Testing (PSCT), and the Patient Interpersonal Guilt Rating Scale (PIGRS) to rate segments of couple sessions. The results were obtained by applying generalized estimating equations and confirm our hypotheses: we could observe a greater presence of testing activity and confirmation of pathogenic beliefs in segments classified as conflictual for both partners and a stronger presence of interpersonal guilt in conflictual versus nonconflictual interactions. These findings support the idea that conflict interactions can be seen as failed attempts by both partners to disconfirm their pathogenic beliefs.

Juror Decision-Making in a Child Trafficking Case: The Impact of Defendant and Victim Gender, Defendant Age, and Defendant Status.

There has been an increase in human trafficking in Canada from 2018 to 2019, which suggests a rising trend in human trafficking, and as such, the number of court cases are likely increasing. Because of this, the current study sought to examine how a defendant and victim's gender, and defendant social status and age impacted mock jurors' decision-making in a child trafficking case. Participants (N = 584) read a mock trial transcript depicting a child trafficking case. They were then asked to render a verdict, answer questions relating to perceptions of the victim and defendant and rate their level of agreements on statements concerning sex and human trafficking. Although there was no effect on dichotomous verdict, mock jurors attributed higher guilt ratings to the male trafficker. Moreover, participants reported more favorable perceptions of the victim when the trafficker was female, and the victim was male compared to female. Participants also reported more favorable perceptions of the victim when the trafficker was of high social status and younger compared to older. Additionally, when mock jurors were well-informed about trafficking victim blaming did not occur. The results of the current study provide some insight into juror perceptions of child sex trafficking cases.

The Burden of Survivorship: Survivor Guilt and Its Association with Psychiatric Sequelae in COVID-19 Patients.

COVID-19 survivors struggle with intense depressive and post-traumatic symptoms in sub-acute stages. Survivor guilt may affect post-acute psychopathology. Herein, we aim to unveil the potential affective mechanism underpinning post-COVID psychiatric implications by focusing on the association of survivor guilt with psychopathology and maladaptive attributional style. At one month after discharge, we evaluated symptoms of depression on The Zung Severity Rating Scale (ZSDS), post-traumatic distress on Impact of Event Scale-Revised (IES-R), and sleep disturbances on the Women's Health Initiative Insomnia Rating Scale (WHIIRS) in 195 COVID-19 survivors. Interpersonal Guilt Rating Scale (IGRS-15) rated survivor guilt. A discrepancy score between the burden of depression and post-traumatic distress symptoms was computed individually. Dysfunctional depressive attributions were assessed through the Cognition Questionnaire (CQ). Survivor guilt significantly predicts all evaluated psychopathological dimensions. Moreover, higher rates of survivor guilt were associated with an overlap between post-traumatic and depressive symptomatology, thus suggesting that survivor guilt equally sustains both psychiatric manifestations. Finally, survivor guilt fully mediated the relationship between dysfunctional depressive attributions and the discrepancy index. Our results confirm survivor guilt as a clinically relevant form of suffering related to psychopathological dimensions of post COVID-19 infection, gaining the status of a specific phenomenon and a promising treatment target.

Mock-Jurors' Judgements in a Sexual Assault Case: The Influence of Defendant Race and Occupational Status, Delayed Reporting, and Multiple Allegations.

Reports of sexual offences have increased in recent years, with many cases involving allegations against high-status individuals (e.g., Harvey Weinstein, Bill Cosby). In addition, many of these cases have involved allegations against the defendant from multiple victims, with long delays in reporting of the alleged assault. The purpose of this study was to examine the influence of defendant occupational status (low vs. high), defendant race (White, Black), number of allegations (one vs. five victims), and the length of reporting delay (5, 20, or 35 years) on mock-juror decision-making. Mock-jurors (N = 752) read a mock-trial transcript describing a sexual assault case. After reading the trial transcript, mock-jurors were asked to provide dichotomous and continuous guilt ratings, as well as ratings regarding their perceptions of the defendant and victim. Results revealed that mock-jurors rendered more guilty verdicts, assigned higher guilt ratings, and perceived the defendant less favorably and the victim more favorably, when the defendant was White (as opposed to Black) and when there were multiple allegations against the defendant. The current findings suggest that defendant race and the number of allegations are highly influential in the context of a sexual assault case.

The impact of developmental language disorder in a defendant's description on mock jurors' perceptions and judgements.

While it has been posited that young people with language needs may be viewed more negatively (e.g., as more rude, less cooperative) than those without language needs, the impact of knowing about a person's language needs on others' perceptions has yet to experimentally tested. To examine whether the presence of a developmental language disorder (DLD) diagnosis in a defendant's information would affect mock juror ratings of guilt, sentence length, credibility and blameworthiness. A total of 143 jury eligible participants read a vignette of a non-violent crime. Half of the participants (N = 73) were told the defendant has a diagnosis of DLD, while half (N = 70) were not told. Preregistered analyses found that DLD information affected ratings of credibility and blameworthiness, though not judgements of guilt or sentence length. Unregistered content analyses were applied to the justifications participants gave for their ratings: these suggested that participants who did not have the DLD information judged the defendant more on his personality and attitude, and drew more links to his (perceived) background, while participants who received the DLD information condition made more reference to him having cognitive problems. Unlike in previous studies of the impact of autism information, information about a defendant's DLD did not affect mock jurors' likelihood of finding them guilty, or lead participants to give longer sentences. However, our findings suggest knowing a person has DLD does affect others' perceptions of credibility and blameworthiness. What is already known on the subject There is already evidence that some conditions that affect communication, specifically autism, also affect juror perceptions. Research also shows that knowing whether or not a defendant has autism influences how jurors rate defendants. However, autism is not the only condition that is relevant to juror perceptions, as we also know that a high rate of young offenders have language needs, and many have language profiles like DLD. What this paper adds to existing knowledge There is little research on how behaviours associated with DLD impact others' perceptions. This study reports the impact of knowing about a defendant's DLD on juror perceptions, investigating whether knowing about DLD improves judgements on guilt, sentencing lengths, credibility and culpability. Beyond the content of youth offending, this study suggests behaviours associated with DLD lead people to form more negative judgements about youth with DLD. This is important because there is still a lack of awareness of DLD both in- and outside the criminal justice system. What are the potential or actual clinical implications of this work? This study shows that knowing about a person's DLD has largely positive effects on others' perceptions of them. This implies that recognizing undetected language needs in young offenders, and supporting colleagues and members of the public to know what DLD is and how it affects people, is critical for youth with DLD to be judged fairly. This study will support the case for raising awareness of vulnerability within the youth justice population, and will assist in clinicians evidencing the need for our roles in justice settings.

Understanding interpersonal guilt: Associations with attachment, altruism, and personality pathology.

The aim of this article is to empirically investigate the relationships among interpersonal guilt, as conceived within control-mastery theory (CMT), and attachment, altruism, and personality pathology in an English-speaking sample. An online sample of 393 participants was recruited to complete the Interpersonal Guilt Rating Scale self-report version-15 (IGRS-15s), together with other empirically validated measures for the assessment of attachment, altruism, and personality pathology. On the basis of previous studies conducted in Italian-speaking samples, we hypothesized that survivor guilt, separation/disloyalty guilt, and omnipotent responsibility guilt would be associated with attachment anxiety and avoidance, altruism, and personality pathology; self-hate was hypothesized to be associated only with attachment anxiety and avoidance and personality pathology. Analyses examined bivariate associations as well as the network of partial correlations among variables. The results largely confirmed hypothesized associations, with self-hate evincing the strongest unique association with personality dysfunction. Findings provide a basis for further research regarding interpersonal guilt and personality and relational functioning, with potential implications for clinical conceptualizations of the role of guilt in psychopathology.

Is feeling bad good enough? Ethical guilt and callous-unemotional traits in childhood.

Lacking the capacity for guilt is a defining characteristic of callous-unemotional (CU) traits. Although guilt is a multifaceted construct, past CU research has rarely considered the reasons underlying children's negative emotional responses to wrongdoing. The present study investigated how different forms of guilt were associated with CU traits during early and middle childhood in a Canadian community sample. We interviewed 4- and 8-year-olds (N = 300; 50% female) to assess their emotion attributions and reasoning in response to hypothetical acts of aggression. Interview responses were used to calculate variables representing undifferentiated, ethical, and non-ethical guilt ratings. Caregivers rated children's CU tendencies at baseline and again 3 years later. Higher ethical guilt was associated with lower CU scores concurrently and 3 years later. Higher non-ethical guilt was associated with higher CU scores at baseline (for older children) and 3 years later (for all children). Undifferentiated guilt was not associated with CU after controlling for demographic variables.

Quantifying an implicit legal threshold and mental representations of ‘Innocent:’ a comparison of implicit and theoretical thresholds for a legal decision

ABSTRACT This study aimed to clarify the standard for layperson’s legal decision and identify factors that contribute to establishing the criterion. Two samples were studied (undergraduate students and community members) to test the hypothesis that laypeople use a lower criterion for their legal decisions than the beyond a reasonable doubt (BRD) rule ordered by law. Relationships among individual’s implicit threshold (IT) for a legal decision and other psychological representations (e.g., not blameworthy, not guilty, desire to punish) were also analyzed. Participants read one of two or three vignettes describing a murder case and provided their verdicts, perceived likelihood of guilt ratings, and quantified mental representations of ‘innocent’ and BRD. In both studies, mean IT was lower than mean BRD. The concordance rate comparison in both studies showed that IT, rather than BRD, is a more accurate measure of laypeople’s legal decision thresholds. In Study 2, IT was positively correlated with representations of ‘innocent,’ suggesting that these representations of ‘innocent’ may be a significant factor that lowered the decision threshold. This study advances knowledge in the field by proposing a novel concept regarding layperson’s legal decision and exploring its relationships with other legal decision-making factors.

The Influence of Testimonial Aids, Victim Age, and Familiarity on Mock Juror Decision-Making in a Sexual Offence Case

The current study examined the influence of testimonial aids (e.g., testifying behind a screen), in combination with victim-defendant familiarity, and victim age, on mock jurors’ judgments in a sexual offence case. The sample included undergraduate mock jurors (N = 256) who read a trial summary and answered questions regarding their perception of defendant guilt and defendant and victim credibility. Mock jurors were impacted by the use of testimonial aids, such that they were more likely to render a guilty verdict and assign higher guilt ratings to the defendant, as well as perceive the victim more positively when a testimonial aid was used compared with testifying live in court. The use of a testimonial aid also interacted with victim-defendant familiarity, such that mock jurors rated the defendant as more guilty when a testimonial aid was used and the defendant was described as a stranger, compared with a familiar family member. The use of testimonial accommodations, in combination with other extralegal factors, impacts mock jurors’ judgments.

The Effect of Delayed Reporting on Mock-Juror Decision-Making in the Era of #MeToo.

The #MeToo movement has given voice to victims of sexual harassment and assault. In many of these cases, there have been long delays in reporting of the sexual offence (e.g., the Harvey Weinstein case). The purpose of this study was to examine how the type of sexual offence (harassment vs. assault) and the length of delayed reporting (15, 25, 35 years) influenced mock-juror decision-making. Mock-jurors (N = 319) read a mock trial transcript depicting an alleged sexual offence and were asked to render a dichotomous verdict, continuous guilt rating, and defendant and victim perception ratings. The data indicated an effect of sexual offence type such that mock-jurors held more favorable perceptions of the defendant when the alleged offence was harassment compared with assault. There also was an effect of delayed reporting such that mock-jurors rendered more guilty verdicts when there was a 25-year delay compared with a 15-year delay. Intriguingly, these results suggest that jurors in sexual offence cases may perceive longer delays in reporting as more believable than shorter delays.

The Influence of Negative Feedback and Social Rank on Feelings of Shame and Guilt: A Vignette Study in 8- to 13-Year-Old Non-Clinical Children

This experimental study examined the role of negative feedback and social rank in the experience of self-conscious emotions, shame and guilt, in typically developing children aged 8 to 13 years. Participants were tested by means of a vignette paradigm in which feedback and social rank were systematically manipulated and levels of shame and guilt were assessed after listening to each of the vignettes. In addition, children completed a set of questionnaires for measuring individual differences in shame and guilt proneness, social comparison, submissive behavior, and external shame. The results showed that children presented with negative feedback reported higher ratings of shame and guilt than when presented with positive feedback, implying that the provision of negative feedback has a significant impact on children’s experience of self-conscious emotions. Social rank had less effect on children’s report of these self-conscious emotions. Furthermore, the individual difference variables of guilt proneness, and to a lesser extent shame proneness and submissive behavior, appeared to be positively related to self-conscious emotions as reported during the vignette task.

Feelings of shame and guilt are associated with distinct neural activation in youth

Shame and guilt are moral emotions that play an important role in social functioning. There is limited knowledge about the neural underpinnings of these emotions, particularly in young people. In the current study, 36 healthy females (mean age 18.8 ± 1.9 years) underwent functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging, during which they reflected on their decisions about social moral dilemmas, and subsequently received negative or positive peer feedback. Ratings of shame and guilt were used as parametric modulators of brain activity. Shame was associated with decreased activity in the superior temporal sulcus and precentral gyrus during reflection. Guilt was associated with decreased activity in the precuneus during positive feedback, and in the hippocampus and supramarginal gyrus during negative feedback. Results suggest that shame and guilt are associated with activity in brain regions involved in social cognition and emotion regulation; however, they have distinct underlying neural circuitry that may be differentiated based on social evaluation.

An Examination of Circadian Impacts on Judgments

Abstract. Many people suffer from insufficient sleep and the adverse effects of sleep deprivation are well documented. Research has shown that people’s judgments can be affected by circadian timing. Across three studies, we examined the impact of time-of-day on people’s judgments about hypothetical legal scenarios, hypothesizing that participants responding at a suboptimal time of day (3–5 a.m.) would give higher guilt ratings and be less sensitive to case information (e.g., evidence strength) than participants responding at a more optimal time of day (2–4 p.m.). Although the time-of-day manipulation influenced participants’ self-reported alertness levels, time-of-day did not affect guilt judgments or sensitivity to case information. This research adds to the literature on how extraneous factors may and may not impact probability assessments.

The Effect of Evidentiary Rules on Conviction Rates

In a criminal trial, a jury may observe characteristics about the defendant (or victim) and use them to form a belief on the likelihood of guilt. Many evidentiary rules attempt to limit this inference. If jury beliefs are rational, such rules may be counterproductive. Any prohibition on the use of defendant characteristics as a form of evidence will never simultaneously reduce conviction rates for the innocent and increase conviction rates for the guilty. In fact, the opposite will occur under plausible conditions. However, if juries are sufficiently biased in their beliefs about guilt rates within groups of defendants, an evidentiary rule may simultaneously reduce wrongful convictions and increase rightful convictions.

Impact of British accents on perceptions of eyewitness statements

The current study looked at the impact of British regional accents on evaluations of eyewitness testimony in criminal trials. Ninety participants were randomly presented with one of three video recordings of eyewitness testimony manipulated to be representative of Received Pronunciation (RP), Multicultural London English (MLE) or Birmingham accents. The impact of the accent was measured through eyewitness (a) accuracy, (b) credibility, (c) deception, (d) prestige, and (e) trial outcome (defendant guilt and sentence). RP was rated more favourably than MLE on accuracy, credibility and prestige. Accuracy and prestige were significant with RP rated more highly than a Birmingham accent. RP appears to be viewed more favourably than the MLE and Birmingham accents although the witness’s accents did not affect ratings of defendant guilt. Taken together, these findings show a preference for eyewitnesses to have RP speech over some regional accents.

Hot and cold cognitive disturbances in antidepressant-free patients with major depressive disorder: a NeuroPharm study.

Cognitive disturbances are common and disabling features of major depressive disorder (MDD). Previous studies provide limited insight into the co-occurrence of hot (emotion-dependent) and cold (emotion-independent) cognitive disturbances in MDD. Therefore, we here map both hot and cold cognition in depressed patients compared to healthy individuals. We collected neuropsychological data from 92 antidepressant-free MDD patients and 103 healthy controls. All participants completed a comprehensive neuropsychological test battery assessing hot cognition including emotion processing, affective verbal memory and social cognition as well as cold cognition including verbal and working memory and reaction time. The depressed patients showed small to moderate negative affective biases on emotion processing outcomes, moderate increases in ratings of guilt and shame and moderate deficits in verbal and working memory as well as moderately slowed reaction time compared to healthy controls. We observed no correlations between individual cognitive tasks and depression severity in the depressed patients. Lastly, an exploratory cluster analysis suggested the presence of three cognitive profiles in MDD: one characterised predominantly by disturbed hot cognitive functions, one characterised predominantly by disturbed cold cognitive functions and one characterised by global impairment across all cognitive domains. Notably, the three cognitive profiles differed in depression severity. We identified a pattern of small to moderate disturbances in both hot and cold cognition in MDD. While none of the individual cognitive outcomes mapped onto depression severity, cognitive profile clusters did. Overall cognition-based stratification tools may be useful in precision medicine approaches to MDD.