Encyclopedia of Psychology and Law

Supreme Court has restricted use of the death penalty

based on the type of crime and the characteristics of

the criminal. Psychologists and other social scientists

have conducted research on issues such as whether the

death penalty serves as a deterrent, what drives public

support for capital punishment, how jurors decide

whether to sentence a defendant to life in prison or

death by execution, and the possibility of wrongful

convictions and executions.

The International Context

Killing is one of the oldest forms of punishment for

criminal behavior, and even today, executions are

widespread. Worldwide, shooting, hanging, behead-

ing, lethal injection, and stoning are the most fre-

quently used methods of execution. According to

Amnesty International, China currently leads the

world in the annual number of executions, followed by

Iran, Saudi Arabia, the United States, and Pakistan.

The United States and Japan are the only industrialized

democracies that still execute criminals. There is a

clear international trend toward abolition—between

1985 and 1995, 37 counties abolished the death

penalty; and between 1995 and 2005, another 22 coun-

tries did so. More than half the countries in the world

have now eliminated capital punishment or have

ceased to carry out executions. Once abolished, capital

punishment is rarely reinstated. Only four countries

have reinstated the death penalty (Gambia, Nepal,

Papua New Guinea, and the Philippines) after abolish-

ing it, and of those, two have since abolished it again.

American Methods of Execution

The three “modern” methods of execution practiced in

the United States—electrocution, poisonous gas, and

lethal injection—were developed in an effort to make

executions more civilized. Prior to the first electrocu-

tion in 1890, hanging was the dominant means of exe-

cution in the United States. Hangings were often

botched, resulting in gruesome spectacles. Government

officials wanted not only to end such spectacles but

also to put an end to hangings, which were strongly

associated in the public mind with lynching and vigi-

lante justice. Each time a new method of execution

was developed—first the electric chair, then the gas

chamber, then lethal injection—the main argument

was that the new method would be more humane and

reliable than its predecessor. Of course, no method of

killing is completely humane or reliable. Lethal injec-

tion, the method now used in 37 of the 38 states that

impose the death penalty, has been challenged on the

grounds that it can cause great pain, although the con-

demned prisoner’s suffering is masked by the paralyz-

ing drugs that are part of the execution process. As

some commentators have noted, discussions of whether

the death penalty is humane must take into account

not only the actual killing of the prisoner but also the

long process preceding an execution, including the

years spent waiting on death row and the rituals lead-

ing up to the execution.

The Supreme Court

and the Death Penalty

The constitutionality of capital punishment has been

challenged on the grounds that it violates the Eighth

Amendment’s prohibition against “cruel and unusual

punishment” or the Fourteenth Amendment’s guaran-

tee of “equal protection” under the law. In the 1972

case of Furman v. Georgia,in a 5:4 decision, the

Supreme Court held that because of the “uncontrolled

discretion of judges or juries,” the death penalty was

being “wantonly and freakishly” applied. Capital

punishment—as administered at the time—was ruled

unconstitutional. However, by 1976, the Court had

approved a series of reforms aimed at controlling the

discretion of judges and jurors (Gregg v. Georgia).

The most important reforms included bifurcated capi-

tal trials, where guilt is decided in the first phase and,

if the defendant is found guilty, a second “penalty

phase” is conducted to determine whether the person

found guilty should be sentenced to death or life in

prison. More recent decisions by the Supreme Court

have placed further restrictions on the penalty of

death. The Court has held that mentally retarded mur-

derers cannot be put to death (Atkins v. Virginia,

2002), only juries (not judges) can decide whether a

convicted murderer should be sentenced to death, and

those who commit their crimes as juveniles cannot be

sentenced to death (Roper v. Simmons, 2005). In states

that authorize the death penalty, only “aggravated”

murder or murder with “special circumstances” is eli-

gible for the death penalty. State laws vary, but exam-

ples of capital crimes include murder for hire, murder

during the commission of a robbery or rape, murder of

a police officer, or kidnapping and murder. The fed-

eral crimes of espionage and treason can also result in

a death sentence.

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