This is for teacher ALEINA KIM only

Race and Social Dominance: Transferring and Sentencing Disparities for Juvenile Offenders

Race and Social Dominance: Transferring and Sentencing Disparities for Juvenile Offenders

The current study examines a possible explanation for why African-American juveniles are being transferred to adult court and found guilty at a higher rate, and receiving harsher punishments than Caucasians (Deitch, Barstow, Lukens, & Reyna, 2009a). Using social dominance theory’s concept of social dominance orientation (SDO), we will examine the relationship between present (i.e., judges and prosecutors) and future (i.e., criminal justice students) legal decision-makers’ levels of SDO and transfer, verdict, and sentence decisions.

Research into the correlates of disparate outcomes between African-American and Caucasian juveniles is divided. Some individuals believe disparities are a result of institutional racism (Human Rights Watch/Amnesty International, 2005) and political ideology (Carmichael, 2010). Others believe that minority youth commit a greater number and more egregious types of crimes compared to Caucasians (Males & Macallair, 2000). The current proposal offers a third plausible explanation by suggesting that transfer, verdict, and sentencing disparities are a result of ideological attitudes influencing the behaviors of legal decision-makers.

Social dominance orientation (SDO) is a measure of the degree to which an individual desires and supports group-based hierarchy and the domination of “inferior” groups by “superior” groups (Sidanius & Pratto, 1999, p. 48). Individuals high in SDO justify their discriminatory acts by supporting hierarchy- enhancing legitimizing myths (e.g., inequality is fair or legitimate) that re-affirm the notion that subordinate groups deserve their position on the lower rung of the social hierarchy (Pratto, Sidanius, & Levin, 2006). Moreover, the best interests of the majority group are served by endorsing these attitudes in order to maintain their status, at the expense of the minority (Eibach & Keegan, 2006).

SDO’s potential to explain biases in decision-making has made it a fruitful topic for researchers. Since race remains the primary group aspect to engage SDO in the United States (Sidanius & Pratto, 1999), prior researchers have used SDO to examine biased decision-making against African-Americans across several areas including affirmative action (Haley & Sidanius, 2006), racial progress (Eibach & Keegan, 2006), and resource allocation (e.g., Sidanius, Haley, Molina, & Pratto, 2007). All of these studies suggest that individuals high in SDO are more likely to make biased decisions against African- Americans than individuals low in SDO. Several researchers have also examined SDO from a criminal justice perspective. For example, Kemmelmeier (2005) found that SDO was positively related to perceptions of guilt for African-American defendants, but negatively related to sentencing decisions for Caucasian defendants. Others found SDO to be positively correlated with support for the death penalty, general punitiveness, and support of lethal torture (Sidanius, Mitchell, Haley, & Navarrete, 2006).

Hypotheses

We hypothesize that one of the contributing factors leading to the disproportionate number of African-American juveniles in the adult system is that legal decision-makers high in SDO: 1) transfer African-American juveniles to adult court more often; 2) find them guilty more often; and 3) sentence them to longer prison terms than legal decision-makers low in SDO.

Methods

Three different samples will be included in the current study: criminal justice students, prosecuting attorneys, and judges. Undergraduate students currently enrolled in criminal justice classes will be used for the current study. Including criminal justice students offers a more realistic test of the current hypotheses than using students from majors such as English and Psychology because criminal justice students are the police officers, attorneys, and judges of tomorrow.

Current prosecuting attorneys will also be included in the current study. Prosecuting attorneys are being sampled because, in 14 states and the District of Columbia, these individuals are allowed the discretion to transfer juveniles to adult court.

The final sample will be actively-presiding juvenile and family court judges. These individuals will be included for two reasons: 1) they are the most likely to transfer juveniles to adult court and 2) they make sentencing decisions.

In order to ensure realism, and pertinence to the dependent variables, there are two further stipulations for inclusion of these judges. First, only those judges presiding in states allowing judicial waivers will be included. Second, only those states allowing for judicial discretion in sentencing (i.e., no mandatory life without parole [LWOP] for certain crimes) will be included. Using these criteria, the final sample will consist of judges from 16 states.

A total of 174 participants will be recruited. Criminal justice students will be recruited through the University of Nevada’s online research system. Prosecuting attorneys and judges will be recruited through the author’s affiliations with the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges (NCJFCJ), which has a membership of over 2,000 judges and prosecuting attorneys who regularly participate in research (i.e., online surveys) originating from the NCJFCJ. Prior research using NCJFCJ judges and attorneys has had a response rate of approximately 30 to 40% (Marsh, personal communication, November 1, 2011; Summers, 2009)—which will easily accommodate the sample size requirements.

The procedures for students, prosecuting attorneys, and judges will differ from one another. However, all participants will begin the study by completing the SDO, Modern Racism, and Authoritarianism scales, as well as a demographic questionnaire.

All participants will read a summary of the case facts concerning an armed robbery and murder trial. At the conclusion of the summary, judges and criminal justice students will make transfer, verdict, and sentencing decisions for the defendants. Prosecuting attorneys will only make a transfer decision for the defendants.

Participants will be randomly assigned to read one of two case summaries; one with two Caucasian defendants and one with two African-American defendants. The case summary was adapted from a prior study (Garberg & Libkuman, 2009) examining decisions to transfer juveniles to adult court. Manipulation checks will be conducted to ensure that there is sufficient variability in the transfer, verdict, and sentencing decisions to permit analysis using inferential statistics. The case summary is a one-page description of the facts concerning an armed robbery and murder involving two 14-year-olds. One of the children was the triggerman and the other was the sidekick. To ensure realism, the case summary will include pictures of the defendants. The race of the defendants will be varied across conditions between African-American and Caucasian. A judge from the NCJFCJ will review, and edit (if necessary), the case summary to ensure its accuracy and realism.

Independent variables. The major variable of interest in the current study, SDO, will be measured using the SDO scale. The SDO scale is a 16-item scale used to assess participants’ level or desire for group dominance. The SDO has been validated using 14 independent samples from six nations and has been found to have a median reliability of .83 (Pratto et al., 2006).

Control variables. The current study will control for several different variables: modern racism, authoritarianism, and race of the legal decision-makers. McConahay, Hardee and Batts’ (1981) Modern Racism Scale (a = .72) will be used as a control variable because prior researchers (Umphress et al., 2008) have controlled for modern racism in their examination of biased decision-making as it pertains to SDO. Modern racism has also been found to be correlated with SDO (e.g., Hodson & Esses, 2005). Similar to modern racism, authoritarianism has been found to be a related, yet distinct concept from SDO (Altemeyer, 2004). Altemeyer’s (2006) updated 22-item Right-wing Authoritarianism scale will be used (a = .90). We will control for the race of the legal decision-makers to ensure that there are no systematic differences between African-American and Caucasian respondents that may influence the results. Prior research (e.g., Lalonde, Giguere, Fontaine, & Smith, 2007) indicates that SDO is significantly correlated to hierarchy beliefs such as attitudes toward interracial dating and transracial adoption for Caucasians, but not African-Americans.

Dependent variables. Transfer recommendation (0 = juvenile justice system or 1 = adult criminal justice system), verdict (0 = not guilty or 1 = guilty), and sentencing recommendations (1 = I do not believe the defendant should be tried in the juvenile justice system to 7 = maximum allowable by law) for the defendants will be the three dependent variables of interest.

References

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