Led by the Spirit: Integrating Social Science and Law to Better Understand the Impact of Jurors' Religious Beliefs

July 2018

Religion is important in the lives of many Americans, and it is no surprise that religion is related to legal attitudes and juror decisions.  However, religion is rather complex, and includes multiple characteristics such as affiliation (e.g., Catholicism, Buddhism, Judaism), beliefs (e.g., fundamentalism, devotionalism, evangelism), and orientation (i.e., intrinsic, extrinsic, and quest).  Each of these characteristics influences what jurors believe and how they express their beliefs. For example, fundamentalists tend to believe that people are responsible for their own behavior and thus fundamentalists tend to be more punitive toward wrongdoers than non-fundamentalists.  In order to further understand the role of religion in the courtroom, it is necessary to explore the complex religiosity of jurors and how religion might influence other aspects of the legal and trial process. Previous research has revealed relationships between religion and legal attitudes and behaviors.  For instance, holding harsh perceptions of God was associated with favoring the death penalty, and attending a fundamentalist church, compared to a non-fundamentalist church, was associated with death penalty support.  The aims of this article are to review the literature and establish how jurors’ religious characteristics relate to their attitudes and decisions, to interpret this in light of relevant court cases, to evaluate and address gaps within the current literature in order to understand where the field currently stands, providing a basis for future research, and to discuss implications for judges, attorneys, and future research.

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Read online here: https://heinonline.org/HOL/Page?collection=journals&handle=hein.journals/faulklr9&id=249