Perceived Remorse and Education: Their Impact on Mock Juror Judgements of Autistic Individuals.
A two-minute autism script turns harsh jurors into fair ones.
01Research in Context
What this study did
The team asked the adults to act as mock jurors. Each person read a short crime story. The defendant was either autistic or not. Half the jurors also got a two-minute script that explained autism basics. Then everyone rated how sorry the defendant seemed and chose a penalty.
The script was simple. It said autistic people may show feelings differently and need clear language. No clinical terms. Just facts a layperson could use.
What they found
Without the script, jurors saw autistic defendants as less remorseful. They also gave harsher penalties.
After the script, remorse scores rose and penalties dropped. The gap between autistic and non-autistic defendants almost vanished.
How this fits with other research
Bassett-Gunter et al. (2017) first showed courts treat autistic people poorly. Their survey found bias. Leah et al. now prove that bias with an experiment and offer a quick fix.
Brewer et al. (2017) tested a similar script in the media. They found the same lift in attitudes. The new study moves that result from news readers to jurors.
Jänsch et al. (2014) said we lack good data on autism and crime. Leah et al. fills that gap with solid numbers.
Ethridge et al. (2020) trained police with a short course and saw gains. Leah et al. shows a two-minute script works for jurors too.
Why it matters
If you serve as an expert witness or help clients prepare for court, share a short autism facts sheet. Two minutes of plain talk can cut harsh penalties. Use the script from this study or write your own in sixth-grade language.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Research indicates that autistic individuals are at increased risk compared to their non-autistic peers of receiving harsher treatment and penalties when interacting with the criminal justice system. Given that remorse is highly regarded in the criminal judicial system and features strongly in comments made by adjudicative constituents when issuing proposed punishments, the present study investigated whether this harshness may be attributed to autistic people being perceived by non-autistic individuals as less remorseful. It was also investigated whether educating people about autism would moderate any mediating relationship between autism diagnosis, perceived remorse, and penalty harshness. Five autistic and five non-autistic individuals participated in video recordings and were instructed to convey remorse for two hypothetical crimes. Non-autistic participants (N = 195) were then randomly allocated one autistic video and one non-autistic video to view and asked to indicate perceived remorse and degree of appropriate penalty harshness. Participants were then educated regarding autistic characteristics and given the option to re-rate perceived remorse and penalty harshness. Results supported the hypothesis that perceived remorse would mediate the relationship between autism diagnosis and penalty harshness. Further, education resulted in a reduction on the harshness of penalty imposed, through improving perceived remorse. These results suggest that autistic individuals may be unfairly disadvantaged within the forensic setting when perceived by non-autistic individuals, due to potential difficulties or differences in displaying remorse. However, the presentation of education regarding autism may mitigate these adverse outcomes, indicating that educating decision makers on potential differences in autistic presentation may be beneficial.
Journal of autism and developmental disorders, 2025 · doi:10.1037/a0016972