Department of Law, Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
Department of Law, Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; Law School, Fundação Getúlio Vargas, Brazil.
Cognition. 2020 Dec;205:104421. doi: 10.1016/j.cognition.2020.104421. Epub 2020 Sep 3.
Higher courts sometimes assess the constitutionality of law by working through a concrete case, other times by reasoning about the underlying question in a more abstract way. Prior research has found that the degree of concreteness or abstraction with which an issue is formulated can influence people's prescriptive views: For instance, people often endorse punishment for concrete misdeeds that they would oppose if the circumstances were described abstractly. We sought to understand whether the so-called 'abstract/concrete paradox' also jeopardizes the consistency of judicial reasoning. In a series of experiments, both lay and professional judges sometimes reached opposite conclusions when reasoning about concrete cases versus the underlying issues formulated in abstract terms. This effect emerged whether participants reasoned with broad principles, such as human dignity, or narrow rules, and was largest among individuals high in trait empathy. Finally, to understand whether people reflectively endorse the discrepancy between abstract and concrete resolutions, we examined their reactions when evaluating both, either simultaneously or sequentially. These approaches revealed no single pattern across lay and expert populations, or exploratory and confirmatory studies. Taken together, our studies suggest that empathic concern plays a greater role in guiding the judicial resolution of concrete cases than in illuminating judges' professed standards-which may result in concrete decisions in violation of their own abstract principles.
高等法院有时通过具体案件来评估法律的合宪性，有时则通过更抽象的方式推理基本问题。先前的研究发现，问题表述的具体程度或抽象程度会影响人们的规定性观点：例如，如果情况被描述得抽象，人们通常会反对具体的不当行为，但如果情况被描述得具体，他们往往会支持惩罚。我们试图了解所谓的“抽象/具体悖论”是否也会危及司法推理的一致性。在一系列实验中，无论是外行还是专业法官，在对具体案件进行推理与对抽象术语表述的基本问题进行推理时，有时会得出相反的结论。这种效应出现在参与者根据广泛的原则（如人的尊严）或狭隘的规则进行推理时，并且在同理心特质较高的个体中最大。最后，为了了解人们是否在反思性地认可抽象和具体解决方案之间的差异，我们考察了他们在同时或依次评估这两种方案时的反应。这些方法在外行和专家群体中，或在探索性和验证性研究中都没有揭示出单一的模式。总的来说，我们的研究表明，同理心关切在指导具体案件的司法裁决方面发挥了更大的作用，而不是阐明法官的公认标准——这可能导致违反自己抽象原则的具体决定。
