The Effect of Smiling on Judicial Decisions

Under revision

Abstract

Various studies have shown that smiling faces are perceived as more attractive than non-smiling faces (e.g. Reis et al 1990). Sad individuals are viewed as less physically attractive compared with neutral or happy (Mueser et al 1984). Other studies have shown that a stereotype exists, also referred to as the ‘halo effect’, whereby a physically attractive person is assumed to also have other positive characteristics (e.g. Dion et al 1972). Although most people believe that a defendant’s character, histo ry and physical attractiveness should not affect jury decisions, in a simulated jury task attractive defendants were evaluated with less certainty of guilt and less severe recommended punishment (Efran 1974).

Primate studies have suggested that smiling in humans may have evolved from the primate appeasement display, a sign of lower status and submission. If so, we should expect smiling in humans when a person is trying to placate another, e.g. when he/she has made a mistake or violated a social norm. The human smile may be initiated in a social context to offer social reassurance , non-hostility or appeasement (Van Hooff 1962).

If this is the case, a smiling offender could be judged more leniently because perceivers believe him to be more penitent. The previous studies that have looked at the effect of smiling on judgement have always studied a minor transgression such as acade mic misconduct. However, on seeing a photograph of a smiling murderer in the newspaper, it seems reasonable to ask oneself why he is smiling, and perhaps consider that he is not remorseful. This study aimed to investigate whether the severity of the cri me affects the ‘smile leniency’ effect. It was predicted that for a minor crime, smiling would serve to make subjects more lenient, whereas for a serious crime it would do the opposite.

McKelvie and Coley (1993) found that unattractive defendants were more likely to be recommended psychiatric treatment. Napoleon et al (1980) found that psychiatric inpatients were regarded as less attractive than middle and high (but not low) income cont rols. They suggested that physically unattractiveness may predispose an individual to a number of negative social outcomes, one being mental illness.

Null Hypothesis: Facial expression will have no effect on severity of recommended punishment for either a serious or minor crime. Alternative Hypothesis: Recommended punishment will be less severe for smiling targets than non-smiling targets in the shoplifting condition, but more severe for smiling targets in the murder condition.

Method

Subjects were 105 undergraduate students tested individually or in small groups. The sample consisted of 45 male and 60 female subjects, aged between 17-26 years, selected by availability sampling (all residents of University Hall, St Andrews).

Materials

Two black and white photographs (2.5x3.5cm) were obtained from Dr Perrett’s perception lab, showing a male target smiling and with a neutral face.

Design

This was a between subjects design. Independent Variables: Facial expression of target (smiling, non-smiling or no photograph) and type of crime (murder or shoplifting). Dependent Variable: Severity of recommended punishment.

Procedure

Subjects were asked to fill in a questionnaire as part of a psychology study about judicial decisions. Subjects participating in a small group were asked not to confer or discuss their decisions.

First subjects were informed that they would read a description of a crime, and then would have to make various ratings and judgements about the guilty party. Guidelines followed concerning what sorts of factors should influence severity of punishment giv en, including type of crime, motive and level of involvement. These were ostensibly to help the subjects with their decisions, but were actually to distract from the real aim of the study and reduce demand effects.

Male and female subjects were randomly allocated to one of six conditions. Subjects saw either a photograph of a smiling target, a non-smiling target, or no photograph. They then read a short crime summary, describing either a shoplifting incident or a murder. Both descriptions were just over 100 words long, and details such as the date and the defendant’s name and occupation were the same in the two descriptions.

Dependent Measures

Subjects then ticked one of five boxes to rate the offender on various characteristics; aggressiveness, sociability, pleasantness, physical attractiveness, dishonesty, cruelty and intelligence. These ratings, other than attractiveness, were mostly distra cters, again to try and reduce demand effects, but we intended to also analyse these ratings to see wheth serious the crime was, how likely it was that the defendant had committed a similar crime in the past, how likely he would be to commit a similar f uture crime, and how helpful psychiatric treatment would be.

Results

From Table 1 it can be seen that median punishment was constant across the crime conditions. The significant difference in further tests showed that this was due to subjects rating psychiatric treatment as more appropriate for a murderer than for a shoplifter. Facial expression had no effect the recommendation of psychiatric treatment.

Spearman’s rank correlations were performed on the various characteristics ratings. Across all groups, attractiveness was correlated negatively with ratings of cruelty (r=-0.36, p=0.009). Considered separately for shoplifting and murder, this effect was only significant for the shoplifting conditions. Attractiveness was also negatively correlated with dishonesty for the shoplifting conditions (r=-0.33, p=0.018), and positively with intelligence (r=0.30, p=0.035) ie. for shoplifting higher attractiveness ratings were associated with less cruelty, greater honesty and greater intelligence . However, attractiveness was positively correlated with ratings of likelihood of having committed a past crime (r=0.34, p=0.016) and with likelihood of future crime (r=0.34, p=0.014), so shoplifters rated as more attractive were seen as more likely to h ave shoplifted in the past and to shoplift in the future. Attractiveness was positively correlated with ratings of seriousness of crime for the three murder conditions (r=0.43, p<0.001), ie. as perceived attractiveness increased so did ratings of seriousness. Male and female subjects may rate differently. To investigate this, each subject was rated 1 (male) or 2 (female). Sex was positively correlated with ratings of aggressiveness (r=0.31, p=0.023), cruelty (r=0.27, p=0.05) and likelihood of committing futu re crime (r=0.34, p=0.012) for the murder conditions. Ie. female subjects rated murderers as significantly more aggressive, cruel and likely to murder again than male subjects.

Discussion

Possible methodological problems

Compared to many other studies, the photographs used in this study were very small, black and white, and showed minimal physical information (chin to hairline), which may have made the stimulus unclear and therefore less influential on decisions. The ind ividual portrayed was not particularly attractive, and a more attractive stimulus may have resulted in an effect of smiling on perceived attractiveness.

The punishment rating used specific punishments, perhaps leading subjects to chose the punishment they believed fitted the crime. The smile may have had more of an effect if subjects had to recommend punishment on a scale of severity (least-most).

Despite being instructed to read the description and then work through the questionnaire quickly, many subjects spent time deliberating about the ratings. A better method may have been one similar to that of Dion (1972), where subjects are given all the i nformation and ratings sheets in an envelope, take out the crime description, read and replace it, then fill in the questionnaire.

Crime situations

The ‘smile-leniency’ effect has generally been studied using transgressions such as academic misconduct, rather than actual crime. Subjects may evaluate punishment on the basis of their knowledge of this sort of crime, whereas typical punishment for acade mic misconduct is not so well-known.

McKelvie and Coley (1993) found attractiveness did not affect severity of punishment for a murder or robbery, but unattractive defendants were more likely to be recommended psychiatric treatment. The present study found no effect of smiling (or perceived attractiveness) on recommendation of psychiatric treatment.

Future Research

This study does not support the hypothesis that the ‘smile-leniency’ effect operates selectively for minor transgressions, but the correlations between the other ratings yielded some interesting results. Attractiveness was correlated negatively with rati ngs of seriousness, for the murder conditions only, suggesting that subjects who considered the murderer more attractive considered his the effect of physical appearance on judgements.

Shoplifters perceived as more attractive however, were also considered more likely to have shoplifted before and to shoplift again. It is possible that attractiveness could be considered an advantage in this sort of crime, giving the target confidence to reoffend. Although significant, these correlations are small, and can only describe relationships; further research is needed to investigate their exact nature.

Sex differences

Young men are the group most at risk from violence, however women fear violence more (Stanko 1987). One in four female victims are attacked by a male assailant. Considering this, the sex differences in ratings are interesting. Female subjects rated mur derers as significantly more aggressive, cruel and likely to commit a future crime than did male subjects. These issues might be interesting for future research.

References

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