By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm:
Lawyers and expert witnesses might be used to thinking of science as just one way among many of proving something: When you need to demonstrate a fact at an empirical level, commission an expert, do a study, and report the results. But there may be more to it than that. The value of the research and the meaning it conveys to the finders of fact, in other words, might go beyond the quality of the data and the strength of the conclusions. Instead, the science and your presentation of it may be conveying a moral point. That could sound counter-intuitive if you think of science and morality as polar opposites: the rational, dispassionate, and method-driven version of “true and false” on one side, and the received philosophical, spiritual or religious view of “right and wrong” on the other. A new study, however, points toward a continuity between the two.
A pair of University of California, Santa Barbara researchers (Ma-Kellams & Blaskovich, 2013) recently conducted four studies on the ways our thoughts about science can trigger moral beliefs and behaviors. The conclusion: An association between science and morality is so ingrained that simply thinking about science can be enough to trigger moral actions and thoughts. What does that mean for the role of science in litigation? For one thing, it suggests that the relevance of your science case doesn’t just end with the legally relevant conclusions. Instead, your presentation should speak to the ways the scientific method overlaps with moral judgment, conveying the message, “We did it right, we did it completely, and we did it fairly.” This post looks into the study, and follows up with a few ideas for presenting your science case in ways that account for this association between method and morality.
The Study: Just Thinking About Science Makes Us More Moral
Published in the PlosOne journal, and reviewed in a recent Scientific American article, the study sought to measure our tendency to see science as a moral pursuit. If we do, then experience in science or simply being reminded of science should cause a normative shift: People should think and act in ways that are guided by the “better angels” of our own beliefs. To test that idea, they conducted four studies. In the first study, science students and students from other disciplines read a vignette about a date rape, and then made a moral judgment about the act ranging from 1 (completely right) to 100 (completely wrong). Experience in science as well as a belief in science positively correlated with a tendency to morally condemn the act. Of course, those science students and science believers could have been different to begin with, so in a second study, the researchers had participants first unscramble either words having to do with science (“hypothesis,” “laboratory,” “science,” “theory,” etc.) or random words prior to evaluating the same vignette. In that case, simply priming the subject of science was correlated with greater moral condemnation.
The researchers wanted to know if this effect extended beyond passive condemnation and into potential action. So in a third study, they gave participants either a neutral or a scientific priming (again, using the unscrambling exercise) and then asked about the participants’ likelihood of engaging in various pro-social activities (donating blood, giving to charity, etc.) that were presented amid a number of other decoy activities. Again, those primed with science were more likely to say they would do good acts in the future. But would they? A fourth study measured behavior by asking participants to receive $5 and decide how they would split that money between themselves and an another anonymous participant. Those primed with science shared more money with the anonymous other.
The picture from this series of studies is that there is something thematic about science: a moral component. And it is not just experience, belief, or knowledge of science that does the trick, but the mere reminder that science exists can convey a subtle “be good” message influencing our judgments and our actions.
The Implications: Litigators Should Account for the Moral Message of Science
Why would science cause a shift in moral behavior? Because we infuse science, and many other appeals, with value. This research is one more example in a long line of research on the powerful affects of priming in persuasion. As we’ve written before, research points to a relatively small set of universal motivators that can improve persuasion when embedded into your case story. While the study doesn’t prove the benefit of any particular strategy of persuasion on science, it does point toward some logical takeaways for those who go to trial with cases that involve research and ask jurors to make comparisons.
Voir Dire on Scientific Attitudes
Potential jurors’ beliefs about science can matter a great deal to the way they view scientific evidence, as we’ve written before. Focusing jurors on science during voir dire is also a way of sending the message that “science matters,” and “we care about good science” which can frame the way jurors start thinking about your case. Based on the results of this study, discussions of science in voir dire can also prime jurors to focus on the moral dimensions of the case, which can be a good thing as long as you’re able to claim at least some measure of morality for your side.
Focus on Method as Much as Result
The research outcomes matter because those are the conclusions the expert is putting into evidence. But for many jurors, the method or process can matter just as much or more. Conveying the research as a story helps: A vexing question, followed by a theory and a number of specific tests, and a few dead-ends later, a Eureka moment that answers the question. That story allows jurors to see the research challenge in human terms instead of just as dead data. The story can also bridge over some gaps in comprehension: Even when they don’t get the exact process or the specific reasons a given method is better than another, they can still get the larger idea of “thorough.”
Use Simple “Better Science” Themes
One thing that’s certain is that a jury is not a peer-review panel weighing the qualitative merits of the research. While jurors can recognize some basic methodological problems, studies show they will frequently fail to grasp any problem that is even a little more advanced. For that reason, it helps to build your science case around some simple themes that bottom-line the reasons why your science is better. By “simple,” I mean messages not much more complicated than the following:
– We have research, they don’t.
– Our research follows a neutral process, their research doesn’t.
– We are following the common method, they aren’t.
– Our results can be replicated, theirs can’t.
I am just coming off extended mock trial on a very technical case. Over the course of the project, probably a full day was spent focused on complicated research methods and expert-versus-expert criticism of methods. Once it came time for deliberations, the jurors were nowhere near getting it all. Instead, as we had expected, they relied on some simple rules of thumb when sorting out the science: Did it seem careful, fair, and complete? As one juror concluded about our expert, despite some withering methodological criticism from the opposing expert, “I believed him because he was thorough.” And when the juror thinks well of our science, that good opinion is likely to rub off on the rest of our case.
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Other Posts on Attitudes Toward Science:
- Yes, Virginia, There is a CSI Effect: Account for It in Your Science Case
- Teach the Difference Between Science and Junk
- Provide the Science Jurors Expect, and the Emotion They Require
- Adapt Your Scientific Testimony to Jurors’ Skeptical Ears
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Ma-Kellams, C., & Blascovich, J. (2013). Does “Science” Make You Moral? The Effects of Priming Science on Moral Judgments and Behavior. PloS one,8(3), e57989.
Image Credit: 123rf.com, Used under license.