Coastal Carolina University.
Chungbuk National University.
Behav Sci Law. 2015 Nov-Dec;33(6):815-26. doi: 10.1002/bsl.2199. Epub 2015 Aug 26.
A recent trend in court is for defense attorneys to introduce brain scans and other forms of biomedical information (BI) into criminal trials as mitigating evidence. The present study investigates how BI, when considered in combination with a defendant's childhood information (CI), can influence the length of a defendant's sentence. We hypothesized that certain combinations of BI and CI result in shorter sentences because they suggest that the defendant poses less of a threat to society. Participants were asked to read accounts of the trial of a murder suspect and, based on the information therein, recommend a sentence as if they were the judge. The defendant was diagnosed with psychopathy, but biomedical information regarding that diagnosis was included or excluded depending on the BI condition. The defendant was further described as growing up in either a loving or abusive family. The results showed that, if BI was present in the trial account, the defendant from an abusive family was perceived as less of a threat to society and received a shorter recommended sentence than if the defendant had been from a loving family. If BI was absent from the account, the pattern was reversed: the defendant from a loving family was perceived as less of a threat to society and received a shorter recommended sentence than if he had been from an abusive family. Implications for the use of BI and CI in court trials are discussed, as well as their relationship to free will and the function of punishment as retribution and utility.
近年来，辩方律师在刑事审判中引入大脑扫描和其他形式的生物医学信息（BI）作为减轻处罚的证据，这一趋势愈演愈烈。本研究旨在探讨 BI 与被告童年信息（CI）结合使用时如何影响被告的刑期。我们假设某些 BI 和 CI 的组合会导致刑期缩短，因为它们表明被告对社会的威胁较小。参与者被要求阅读谋杀案嫌疑人审判的记录，并根据其中的信息，就好像他们是法官一样建议刑期。被告被诊断患有精神变态，但关于该诊断的生物医学信息是否包含取决于 BI 条件。被告进一步被描述为在充满爱意或虐待的家庭中长大。结果表明，如果 BI 在审判记录中存在，那么来自虐待家庭的被告被认为对社会的威胁较小，建议的刑期比来自充满爱意的家庭的被告更短。如果记录中没有 BI，则会出现相反的模式：来自充满爱意家庭的被告被认为对社会的威胁较小，建议的刑期比来自虐待家庭的被告更短。本文讨论了 BI 和 CI 在法庭审判中的应用及其与自由意志的关系，以及惩罚作为报应和效用的功能。
