Encyclopedia of Psychology and Law

Further Readings

Brodsky, S. L., Zapf, P. A., & Boccaccini, M. T. (2001). The

last competency: An examination of legal, ethical, and

professional ambiguities regarding evaluations of

competence for execution. Journal of Forensic Psychology

Practice, 1,1–25.

Brodsky, S. L., Zapf, P. A., & Boccaccini, M. T. (2005).

Competency for execution assessments: Ethical

continuities and professional tasks. Journal of Forensic

Psychology Practice, 5,65–74.

Ford v. Wainwright, 477 U.S. 399 (1986).

Heilbrun, K. S. (1987). The assessment of competency for

execution: An overview. Behavioral Sciences and the Law,

5,383–396.

Zapf, P. A., Boccaccini, M. T., & Brodsky, S. L. (2003).

Assessment of competency for execution: Professional

guidelines and an evaluation checklist. Behavioral

Sciences and the Law, 21,103–120.

CHICAGOJURYPROJECT

The Chicago Jury Project was a large-scale social sci-

ence research initiative in the 1950s. This entry pro-

vides a descriptive portrait of the project, followed by

a brief summary of the primary studies associated with

it, and then a discussion of the project’s legacy and its

impact on the field of psychology and law. In essence,

the Chicago Jury Project was a groundbreaking scien-

tific endeavor that employed a variety of social science

methods and anticipated a host of current research

streams. It remains an impressive accomplishment and

can fairly be said to represent the inaugural event in the

scientific study of jury decision making.

Overview

The Chicago Jury Project, also known as the American

Juries Project, was conceived as an innovative effort to

study the American legal system using behavioral sci-

ence methods. Initiated in 1953 with funding from a

$400,000 grant from the Ford Foundation, the project

was housed at the University of Chicago. A variety of

research studies were undertaken with the aid of pro-

ject funding, not all of which were concerned with

juries (e.g., arbitration). The project was led primarily

by three individuals: Harry Kalven (a law professor),

Hans Zeisel (a sociologist, statistician, and law profes-

sor), and Fred Strodtbeck (a social psychologist),

although more than 20 other individuals were affiliated

with the project, including Dale Broeder and Rita

James Simon. The initial funding was spent by 1956,

which triggered a review of project activities and find-

ings by the Ford Foundation. A second round of fund-

ing from Ford enabled some arms of the project (most

notably the work on juries) to continue until 1959, at

which point active data collection ceased. A bibliogra-

phy published in 1966 listed more than 60 journal arti-

cles published by researchers associated with the

project. In-depth summaries of selected project initia-

tives were subsequently published in three book-length

volumes titled Delay in the Court(1959),The American

Jury(1966), and The American Jury: The Defense of

Insanity(1967). The physical records of the project are

currently held in 10 boxes at the Special Collections

Research Center at the University of Chicago’s Law

School.

Few social science research projects receive public

attention, and even fewer achieve any that is sustained,

but the Chicago Jury Project actually caused some-

thing of a national scandal at one point in its existence.

One early initiative involved audiotaping the delibera-

tions of five civil jury trials in the federal district court

in Wichita, Kansas. Although this was done with the

assent of the trial judge and counsel for both sides, the

jurors were unaware that their discussion was being

recorded. When this became public knowledge in the

summer of 1955, uproar ensued. The methodology was

publicly censured by the Attorney General of the

United States, a special hearing was initiated by the

Senate Judiciary Committee, and more than 30 juris-

dictions subsequently enacted statutes prohibiting the

direct observation or recording of jury deliberations.

Project Studies and Results

As noted above, the Chicago Jury Project consisted of

a number of different research initiatives involving

several major methodological strategies: (a) analysis

of archival data on court system functioning, (b) sur-

veys, (c) intensive interviews with attorneys and jurors,

and (d) experimental research with mock juries. This

section briefly summarizes the project activities and

findings within each methodological domain.

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Much of the early work associated with the project

involved taking stock of the descriptive research

already done by others. One line of inquiry was com-

parative in nature and attempted to identify what had

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