Racial bias in juror decision-making: A meta-analytic review of defendant treatment

Tara L. Mitchell, Lock Haven University
Ryann M. Haw, Big Bend Community College
Jeffrey E. Pfeifer, University of Regina
Christian A. Meissner, University of Texas at El Paso

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Author Posting © Springer, 2005. This is the author's version of the work. It is posted here by permission of the Springer for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Law & Human Behavior, Volume 29, Issue 2, April, 2005. doi: 10.1007/s10979-005-8122-9.
http://dx.doi.org/ 10.1007/s10979-005-8122-9.
The original publication is available at www.springerlink.com.

Abstract

Common wisdom seems to suggest that racial bias, defined as disparate treatment of minority defendants, exists in jury decision-making, with Black defendants being treated more harshly by jurors than White defendants. The empirical research, however, is inconsistent – some studies show racial bias while others do not. Two previous meta-analyses have found conflicting results regarding the existence of racial bias in juror decision-making (Mazzella & Feingold, 1994; Sweeney & Haney, 1992). This research takes a meta-analytic approach to further investigate the inconsistencies within the empirical literature on racial bias in juror decision-making by defining racial bias as disparate treatment of racial out-groups (rather than focusing upon the minority group alone). Our results suggest that a small, yet significant, effect of racial bias in decision-making is present across studies, but that the effect becomes more pronounced when certain moderators are considered. The state of the research will be discussed in light of these findings.