Deliberations

Supreme Court Term Just Got Less Interesting

As the stock market and the presidential campaign get even more interesting, in an anxious and painful sort of way, at least jury watchers can pay a little less attention to the Supreme Court term.  The Court refused today to decide two cases involving jury issues.  From Scotusblog:

Among the more significant issues the Court turned aside, by simply denying review, were the constitutionality of convicting an individual of a crime by a non-unanimous jury verdict (Lee v. Louisiana, 07-1523), [and] the constitutionality of jurors’ using a Bible during secret deliberations on whether to sentence a convicted individual to death (Lucero v. Texas, 07-1429)[.]

Scotusblog's detailed rundown on Lee v. Louisiana is here, and and there's a briefer synopsis of Lucero v. Texas in the list here.  

Still murky, still clear

The two denials leave one question as clear as ever, and the other as murky as ever.  The denial in Lee means it's still constitutional under Apodaca v. Oregon for states to allow criminal convictions by less than unanimous verdicts.  Mr. Lee had hoped to convince the Court's strict constructionists to return to the unanimous jury the founding fathers might have expected; others will likely keep trying.

In Lucero, a Texas jury answered questions in a way that mandated the death penalty after the foreman read this passage from Romans 13:1-6 aloud:

1Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. 2Consequently, he who rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves. 3For rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but for those who do wrong. Do you want to be free from fear of the one in authority? Then do what is right and he will commend you. 4For he is God's servant to do you good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword for nothing. He is God's servant, an agent of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer. 5Therefore, it is necessary to submit to the authorities, not only because of possible punishment but also because of conscience. 6This is also why you pay taxes, for the authorities are God's servants, who give their full time to governing.

The jurors all submitted affidavits saying the reading didn't change their verdict, and the trial judge denied an evidentiary hearing.  The Texas Supreme Court affirmed.  The Bible comes up in the jury room more often than you might think, and the Lucero denial leaves judges to handle the issue case by case.

Judges, prosecutors and criminal defense lawyers, weigh in:  would a ruling in either of these cases have made a difference for you? 

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Related posts here: 

• The Pros And Cons Of Death:  The Bible In The Jury Room. (Probably the most searched post I've ever written; an amazing number of people run searches for the "pros and cons" of the death penalty.)
• The Unanimity Requirement In Real Life
• The Details Of Unanimity:  Classroom And Courtroom
• The Long Way To Unanimity

(Photo by Luis Fabres at http://www.flickr.com/photos/lfabresm/2368767518/; license details there.)

 

When Deliberations Fail

Why does a jury have to be a group of six or twelve instead of say, one person?  Because groups make better decisions than individuals, most people would say.

And they do make better decisions -- sometimes.  Except when they don't:

Much of the time, both private and public groups often blunder not in spite of deliberation but because of it. After deliberation, companies, labor unions, and religious organizations often make bad decisions; the same point holds for governments.

That's Profs. Cass Sunstein and Reid Hastie talking, the University of Chicago's law school and business school respectively.  Their paper "Four Failures of Deliberating Groups" has just been posted on SSRN.  Jury fans need to understand this paper, and jury doubters will love it. 

"The truth played a role, too . . ."

Drawing on research from psychology and business as well as a few studies of jurors, Sunstein and Hastie patiently list the ways groups can go wrong.  Mistakes begin at the simplest level, when an individual who has the facts right cannot convince a mistaken majority:

[A] comprehensive study has demonstrated that majority pressures can be powerful even for factual questions to which some people know the right answer.  The study involved twelve hundred people, forming groups of six, five, and four members. Individuals were asked true-false questions involving art, poetry, public opinion, geography, economics, and politics. They were then asked to assemble into groups, which discussed the questions and produced answers. The majority played a substantial role in determining each group’s answers. The truth played a role, too, but a lesser one. If a majority of individuals in the group gave the right answer, the group’s decision moved toward the majority in 79 percent of the cases. If a majority of individuals in the group gave the wrong answer, the group’s decision nonetheless moved toward the majority in 56 percent of the cases.

"Much garbage out"

And it gets worse.  Groups can not only pick up the errors of individual members, but they can make them bigger:

For purposes of assessing deliberation, a central question is whether groups avoid the errors of the individuals who comprise them. There is no clear evidence that they do, and often they do not—a vivid illustration of the principle, “garbage in, garbage out,” in a way that mocks the aspiration to collective correction of individual blunders. In fact, individual errors are not merely replicated but actually amplified in group decisions—a process of “some garbage in, much garbage out.”

These aren't tort reformers gathering research to support a cause, or at least I don't think so.  The paper hardly mentions juries, focusing more on decisionmaking in the business world -- and Sunstein clerked for Thurgood Marshall and is campaigning for Barack Obama.  The fact is, they're right that these errors can and do happen.  Watch a few mock trials and you'll quickly observe the "four failures" Sunstein and Hastie describe:  "amplification of cognitive errors," "cascades," "group polarization," and "over-weighting common knowledge." 

If you value juries, and most people do, the value of this paper is the way it dramatizes a skill that all lawyers need and most don't have.  You need to be able to explain how juries can make good decisions:  how to disagree with respect, how to catch each other's errors, and so on.  It isn't easy, but Sunstein and Hastie will soon offer help; this paper is a chapter from their upcoming book, called Smart Groups.

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Note:  Thanks to The Situationist for flagging this paper.  The Situationist is relevant to jury watchers even when (maybe especially when) its topic is far from the courtroom; if you ever decide to reduce the number of blogs you read, you should probably drop mine before you drop theirs. 

(Photo by Julie Berlin at http://www.flickr.com/photos/jule_berlin/839245545/; license details there.) 
 

The Long Way To Unanimity

The California Court of Appeals opinion in People v. Carrasco on Friday didn't quote this part, but it's easy to imagine.  The jury has just come back guilty on an attempted arson charge.  A California defendant can be convicted only by a unanimous jury, so the judge polls the jurors:

The Court:  "Juror No. 2, is this your verdict?"

Juror No. 2:  [no response]

The Court (maybe looking up sharply, perhaps a little louder):  "Juror No. 2, is this your verdict?"

Juror No. 2:  [after a pause] "Yes."  And she starts to cry.

Cross-examination by the Court:

Not the hearty affirmation the judge was hoping for.  So he sent the other jurors out of the courtroom and, before accepting the verdict, talked things over with Juror No. 2.  This part of the transcript is in the opinion, and you have to read all of it to understand just how much work it took to bring this juror into the fold:

“THE COURT: . . . [¶] Juror No. 2, you hesitated answering, and you teared up; and it appears that when you did give an answer, ‘yes,’ it was in a soft voice and you appear to be obviously emotionally distraught. [¶] Is the verdict that you rendered by saying yes to guilt as to counts 2, 3 and 4, is that your verdict? Is that your decision?

“JUROR NO. 2: No.

“THE COURT: All right. And it took Juror No. 2 some time to answer the question. [¶] Did you decide to vote the way you did because of the fact that you felt compelled because the other jurors were voting that way?

“JUROR NO. 2: Yes.

“THE COURT: Okay. So that is not your true intent to vote guilty for -- I’m not going to designate which count, but your guilty verdict was because you felt compelled or pressured because the other jurors were voting that way; is that correct?

“JUROR NO. 2: (No response.)

“THE COURT: Go ahead and explain to me that -- nobody will know about, the other jurors won’t know about our discussion here -- but I want to know what went on in the jury room that made you come up with a guilty verdict when you’re now indicating that that was not really your desire or intent.

“JUROR NO. 2: I had reasonable doubt.

Stop there, and there's no verdict.  But it didn't stop there.

“THE COURT: Okay, and in spite of the reasonable doubt, you came back with a verdict of guilty. [¶] Tell me what went on in the jury room, basically as to why you changed that reasonable doubt to a verdict of guilty.

“JUROR NO. 2: I guess, you know, when they were saying it was a felony, I wasn’t aware they were felony charges. That’s what made me start crying.

“THE COURT: Well, the question is not whether or not they are felony charges or any other charge; that’s not an issue. [¶] The issue is whether or not, based upon the evidence and everything you heard, you felt the defendant was guilty, irrespective of felony or what. [¶] The purpose of a jury is to decide the issue of guilt based upon the evidence and based upon the standard of reasonable doubt.

“JUROR NO. 2: Uh-huh.

“THE COURT: So I want to know -- your vote was for guilty.

“JUROR NO. 2: Yes.

“THE COURT: And now are you having second thoughts because you gleaned that the charges are a felony?

“JUROR NO. 2: Yes.

“[PROSECUTOR]: Well, I believe she has indicated that her findings were for guilt and --

“[DEFENSE COUNSEL]: Your Honor, I have to confess I’ve never had this situation before.

“THE COURT: I don’t think any of us have had this, and I want to be satisfied. [¶] First of all, this is your own personal decision; nobody in the jury room during deliberations put any pressure on you?

“JUROR NO. 2: No.

“THE COURT: That answer is no?

“JUROR NO. 2: No.

“THE COURT: Okay, so the reason why you are now somewhat equivocating on your vote is because you believe -- or you have reason to believe that the charges constitute a felony; is that right?

“JUROR NO. 2: Yes.

“THE COURT: But otherwise, based upon everything that you heard, all the evidence and the instructions the court gave you on the law, the argument of the attorneys, you were satisfied the defendant was guilty beyond a reasonable doubt? Going that far?

“JUROR NO. 2: Yes.

“[PROSECUTOR]: And that was the only thing she was asked to do. [¶] . . . [¶]

“[DEFENSE COUNSEL]: Your honor, are we allowed to inquire at all?

“THE COURT: I don’t think so at this point in time, Ms. Williams [defense counsel]. . . . That’s something we’ll have to explore later, I think, if that should arise. [¶] But just so that I have an understanding, because this may or may not lead to something else that doesn’t per se involve you, your concern now is and your hesitation now is that the defendant may have been charged with felonies?

“JUROR NO. 2: I wasn’t aware of that. [¶] . . . [¶]

“THE COURT: Well, don’t forget when I instructed the jury, I instructed the jury that they are not to consider the issue of punishment or penalty; that issue is solely for the court, depending upon many factors, not only the nature of the crime, but various other factors. So that’s something you’re not to be concerned with. [¶] I want to be satisfied that your vote for guilt as to count 2, the resisting arrest, if you will, or detention by Officer Macias; count 3, the same charge as to another officer; count 4, the attempted arson, if you will, that you were satisfied that based upon the evidence you heard, again, and the instructions on the law that I gave you, the arguments of the attorneys, you were satisfied that those charges have been proved beyond a reasonable doubt; is that correct?

“JUROR NO. 2: Yes.”

Really?

Was that a real "yes," even though the first one wasn't?  Or was Juror No. 2 trying to say that Carrasco sounded a lot more like a mentally ill man on a self-destructive mission than like a real arsonist?  (The arson incident started when Carrasco walked into a Los Angeles County sheriff's station and asked the first deputy he saw, "Do you have change, bitch?"  Eventually Carrasco challenged deputies to "Go ahead, bitch, fucking shoot me," and was subdued only by at least five deputies and pepper spray.  Then they found gasoline and rags in his duffel bag.)

Carrasco's lawyer hadn't objected to the judicial cross-examination, and he didn't argue on appeal that the verdict wasn't unanimous.  Instead, the argument was that the judge should have granted defense counsel's request to contact Juror No. 2.  The appellate court upheld the trial judge 2-1, saying there was "no showing" of juror misconduct, and that defense counsel should have "proposed an additional line of inquiry" to the trial judge, even though she'd been shut down when she asked to inquire herself.

Only in the dissent do you find the words you're looking for here:  "I think that at this point the juror had made it adequately clear that she did not intend to find the defendant guilty."  Defense counsel didn't need to object, said the dissenting judge; although no California case has yet dealt with the issue, "there is every indication, in my opinion, that a less than unanimous verdict is reversible error per se."

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Notes:

1. The majority opinion does offer a little help to future defense counsel in this position, in a long Footnote 4: "When Juror No. 2 then stated, 'I had reasonable doubt,' better practice might have been to send the jury back to the jury room for further deliberations."
2. Should this opinion somehow leave you in need of further convincing to poll the jury on every guilty verdict, every time, see Mark Bennett, here among lots of other places.

(Photo by Arthit Suriyawongkul at http://www.flickr.com/photos/arthit/1057392143/; license details there.)  

Late For Uma Thurman

"If something happens and I post on it in 45 minutes, I'm timely.  If something happens and I post on it the next day, it's kind of stale." 

So (or approximately so) said Mark Herrmann of Drug And Device Law Blog today, when I had the honor of speaking on a panel with him at the State Bar of Wisconsin's annual convention.  Our topic was blogs and blogging, and we were joined by charming Bonnie Shucha of WisBlawg.

I secretly winced when he said it, because I knew my post today would be stale.  It was yesterday that Wall Street Journal reporter Emily Steel wrote about the jury deliberations in the Uma Thurman stalker trial this week -- from her privileged vantage point as a deliberating juror herself.  I saw it in the WSJ Law Blog, and put it in my news feed right away, but I didn't get a post up. 

Different posts for different folks

Now, of course, the story is all over not only the blogs but the news wires, with its twin attractions of eavesdropping on a jury and Uma Thurman, for heaven's sake.  Different blogs had different perspectives, and they're all good:

--Scott Greenfield at Simple Justice got to it right away, of course.  He highlighted the part I keep harping on here:  there were two lawyers on the jury, and a comment from one of them made a big difference.  "So much for getting legal instructions from the judge, with the attorneys capable of objecting and preserving," says Scott.

--Jeralyn Merritt at TalkLeft picked up the lawyer's role too, and also caught a media angle.  "Perhaps [Steel] just helped the defendant in a bid for a new trial," she says, since Steel documented the juror who saw (and liked) the courtroom artist's sketches.  "Where would s/he have seen the sketch artist's depictions but in a newspaper?" Jeralyn asks.

--Brad Parker at Where's Travis McGee focuses on the lawyer, but imagines himself in the lawyer's place, and wonders what he'd tell his fellow jurors.  (Where's Travis McGee was a new blog to me; thanks to Blawg Review's Ed. for the tip.)

--It took a nonlawyer blogger to question Ms. Steel herself.  "I'd love to know if she told the other jurors she was a reporter and was writing down everything they said for an article," says Jodi of the MamaPop blog.

(Photo by Brandon Weight at http://www.flickr.com/photos/brandonweight/2267541061/; license details there.)

Hizzoner The Foreman

I don't know why a 1999 New York Times story suddenly showed up in my news feeds, but I'm glad it did, because I missed it the first time.  Rudolph Guiliani, then mayor of New York, spent a week on jury duty in a personal injury case that year. 

Not surprisingly, he was foreman.  Not surprisingly, he was a big hit with the rest of the group.  And not surprisingly, the plaintiff lost.

"No."

The story starts:

As five jurors who heard a personal injury case in Manhattan emerged from State Supreme Court, they had praise for the jury foreman, describing him as a regular guy who came across, in their words, as ''unpretentious'' and ''friendly.''

''You'd expect a man with responsibility for a $30 billion annual budget to always be on cell phones during breaks or talking to aides, but he wasn't,'' said Caleb Silver, 28, a business reporter who served on the jury. ''When we took breaks, he took breaks. When we drank coffee, he drank coffee.''

In more typical get-down-to-business style, the famed foreman, Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, used just one word -- no-- in announcing that he and his fellow jurors had rejected a $7 million claim from a man who said that searing shower water had scalded his genitals so badly that it had rendered him impotent.

The rest, equally good reading, is here. 

Like a juror

''I let the other jurors express their opinions first,'' Giuliani told the Times, adding that "his fellow jurors had treated him 'like a juror, not like the Mayor.'"  Likewise, "[m]embers of the panel, which consisted of a corporate executive, a college student, a registered nurse and a lawyer as well as the Mayor, said they were unswayed by Mr. Giuliani's presence."  Maybe so.  But if you think those other people, no matter how distinguished, could have talked the mayor out of the verdict he wanted, think again.

And thus we build our list of guaranteed jury leaders.  So far we have lawyers, sitting legislators, the judge's mom, and now we can add the mayor of one of the world's largest cities.  You can leave any of these people on your jury if you want to.  Just understand:  if you do it, you have a jury of one. 

(Photo (c) 2007 Bill Fish Photography at http://www.flickr.com/photos/protectourprimary/477145883/; license details there.)

Jury Duty Saves A Life

Sure, it's a fundamental bulwark of liberty, the only place in our system where a few ordinary citizens can deny the power of prosecutors, judges, presidents, and legislators.  Big deal, compared to this, from South Dakota's Rapid City Journal:

A juror in a federal rape trial may have saved the life of a fellow juror who was choking by performing the Heimlich Maneuver on her.

The two were part of a 12-person jury deliberating the fate of Jason Pumpkin Seed, 20, after a trial in U.S. District Court last week. Pumpkin Seed of Wounded Knee was charged with aggravated sexual abuse.

The trial began last Tuesday afternoon and went to the jury about 10:20 a.m. Thursday. At 1 p.m., U.S. District Judge Andrew Bogue was notified of a “health situation” in the jury room and called a recess.

A U.S. District Court spokesman said the jurors were eating a catered lunch together when a woman began choking. Another juror performed the Heimlich, which dislodged the food.

An ambulance was called but did not transport the woman to the hospital. However, Bogue excused the woman so she could see a doctor.

Court documents show that the remaining 11 jurors returned to deliberating shortly after 1:30 p.m. and returned a guilty verdict at 4:30 p.m.

In case you're wondering, defense counsel couldn't object to the decision to continue with eleven.  Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 23(b)(3) says that  "After the jury has retired to deliberate, the court may permit a jury of 11 persons to return a verdict, even without a stipulation by the parties, if the court finds good cause to excuse a juror."  I haven't looked for cases on point, but it's likely that a near-death experience over lunch counts as good cause.

(Photo by Donnaphoto at http://www.flickr.com/photos/77043400@N00/2191397098/; license details there.)

Bringing Unconscious Bias Out Of The Dark

Last week I wrote about the troubling study suggesting that "many Americans subconsciously associate blacks with apes."  Commenter Roy Wilson asked for a constructive response:  "Any thoughts about this topic in relation to jury composition as it might affect deliberation?"

I do have a thought -- not an answer, but a thought.  More accurately, Tufts professor Samuel R. Sommers has a thought, explained in his 2006 paper in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.  The thought is:  jury diversity.  Prof. Sommers's research suggests that diversity in the jury itself can bring unconscious biases out of the shadows.

Diverse juries, better juries

In the study described in the paper, Prof. Sommers and his colleagues recruited enough people to make up 29 separate six-person juries.  (Unlike many university-based psychological studies, this one used jury-eligible adults from the community, not college students.)  Some of the juries included only white jurors; the rest were composed of four white jurors and two black jurors.  Each jury listened to a Court TV summary of a sexual-assault trial of a black defendant. 

When the groups deliberated about the summarized trial, the diverse groups performed far better.  They raised and discussed more of the evidence they had seen.  They mentioned more "missing" evidence, things they had not seen that they thought would have been helpful.  And they were more willing to mention, and discuss, the possible role of racism in the case.

Discussing what's uncomfortable

Most striking, it wasn't only the black jurors who added to the discussion in the diverse juries.  Instead, the white jurors were more willing to raise and discuss issues when the black jurors were there.  On the topic of racism, for example, Sommers quotes several exchanges from his juries, and concludes: 

Participants in all-White groups seemed surprised at and were made uncomfortable by the mention of racism during deliberations. Perhaps they had given little thought to racial issues to that point in the experiment. True, the defendant was a Black man, but race was not discussed during the trial, nor would a cursory look around the room suggest that such a potentially controversial issue would be brought up during deliberations. Whites in diverse groups, on the other hand, reacted differently. They did not automatically change the topic when racism came up, but rather engaged in substantive conversation about it. Members of diverse groups did disagree while deliberating, at times vociferously, but they devoted time to discussing even polarizing and uncomfortable topics.

It rings true, of course; you've seen it happen yourself.  When you're talking to a person of another race, you're more conscious of racial context, overtones, and issues.  Diversity works like a flashlight.  It may not cure racism, but it can bring racial biases out where we can talk about them.

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Notes:

1. Prof. Sommers has spent the last several years studying race and juries.  I wrote here on his paper on purportedly "race-neutral" peremptory challeges under Batson; his other papers are linked to, in full, on his Tufts bio page.  Thanks to him and Tufts for that.
2. Not surprisingly, diverse juries are also perceived as more fair and legitimate by the public than all-white or all-black juries are.  Northwestern professor Shari Seidman Diamond and Dr. Leslie Ellis (now of TrialGraphix) showed that in their paper "Race, Diversity, and Jury Composition:  Battering and Bolstering Legitimacy," in the Chicago-Kent Law Review in 2003. 
3. So does Batson let you strike white jurors in the name of a diverse jury?  Don't expect a case on point soon, but probably not.  Another obstacle on the Batson collision course.
4. Related posts here:

• Batson, Day To Day
• Another Day, Another Unconscious Bias Study
• A Helpful Way To Think About Race.

(Photo by Dan at http://www.flickr.com/photos/ladnlins/1822774622/; license details there.)

Deliberations On Holiday

I'm taking a blogging vacation for the next two weeks, the better to focus on family and friends as the year ends.  It's an even better time to take a break than I thought it would be:  Corrections Sentencing is doing my blogging for me, reporting an amazing story of jurors who found evidence in the jury room that the police and lawyers for both sides had missed.

I may do a pointer post here and there, and I'll keep flagging "In The News" stories.  (You can subscribe to those, but it's a separate subscription from blog posts.  The feed for "In The News" is here.) 

Happy holidays, and see you in January.

(Photo by Justin Russell at http://www.flickr.com/photos/nightthree/308307526/; license details there.)

A Holdout Juror Relents, And Then Repents

Here's a rare variation on a very common story.  A holdout juror in Florida felt so bad about giving up and joining a guilty verdict that she paid the defendant's fine:

Patricia Klugherz reluctantly voted with other jurors to convict Joyce Buffaloe of making a false 911 call during a late night traffic stop, then she stuck around the courtroom for the sentencing.

The more Klugherz thought about it, the more she felt the police officers were out of line when responding to a black woman who questioned their behavior. And she concluded that Buffaloe called 911 to get help, not to annoy those officers -- as other jurors concluded.

So, the jury's 73-year-old forewoman did something almost unheard of. She gave $220 to the woman she just convicted, enough to cover the fine and court costs.

"She seemed very sincere, she was shaking her head, 'I'm so sorry this happened to you,' " Buffaloe said. "This is the craziest thing."

The gesture left Buffaloe confused but grateful, and Klugherz feeling a little better about a case in which she feels she caved in to other jurors and convicted a woman who did not deserve it.

"It made me feel very guilty that I did it," said Klugherz. "I will always feel like I made a mistake."

The story, in southwest Florida's Herald Tribune, continues here.  Ms. Buffaloe called 911 after officers who pulled her over "cursed at her and pointed their stun gun at her, all while her 8-year-old son was in the back seat."  The officers pulled her from her car and took her to jail; the story doesn't say what happened to the little boy.

How to help a holdout

Holdout jurors give up and give in all the time, as we've discussed.  They sometimes try to make amends by contacting the judge or one of the lawyers, but you don't often -- maybe don't ever -- see them taking the defendant's punishment.  But then few criminal trials end in fines, and even the most repentent juror can't go to prison in the defendant's place.

Advice on this topic is the same as ever:  if you think you may need holdout jurors, teach them how to hold out -- during the trial, not after.  Let them know how important it is, and how hard it is, to stick patiently to their decisions when other jurors, and the promise of going home, press in.  Help them rehearse in their minds how they'll do it, if they need to. 

(Photo by Jean-Etienne Poirrier at http://www.flickr.com/photos/jepoirrier/2043734850/; license details there.)

How To Be Better Looking

Remember that guy you dated in college, whose striking good looks grew less noticeable as you began to see how annoying he was?  Or girl -- you know the one I mean.  New research shows it wasn't just you.  We judge each other's looks not just by hair and cheekbones, but by personality traits.  This is good news if you're facing a jury and your client isn't -- or you're not -- beautiful.

Pretty is as pretty does

The paper is "Personality goes a long way: The malleability of opposite-sex physical attractiveness," by Gary Lewandowski and others, in a journal called Personal Relationships.  There isn't a free copy on line, but you can get the gist from the abstract and the press release. 

The experiment was simple:  take 78 college students, show them pictures of people of the opposite sex, and ask them to rate how attractive the people in the pictures are.  Then wait while they "participate in a distraction task." (I just love social-science writing.)  Later, ask them to rate the pictures again -- but this time, tell them something about the personalities of the people they're looking at.

Just like that guy in school, the people in the pictures got plainer or prettier, in the eyes of the research subjects, depending on what their personalities were supposed to be like.  Honesty and helpfulness looked good; unfairness and rudeness looked bad.  As the abstract puts it, "personality information produced significant changes in ratings of physical attractiveness for attractive, neutral, and unattractive targets." 

More than skin deep

Does this have anything to do with juries?  Absolutely.  Like it or not, physical beauty matters to jurors, as a British study in March most recently showed.  Back then I got to spend one long post on the study itself and another one on what to make of it.  One thing I said was "Remember 'more than skin deep.'  . . . If you have a witness you think may be stereotyped because of the way he looks, there are ways to let the jury see the beauty of his character."  I didn't have a study to cite when I said it, but there is one now.

(Photo by Franco Folini at http://www.flickr.com/photos/livenature/269044687/; license details there.)