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9 - The Jury in Canada

Testing the Comprehensibility of Styles of Jury Instructions and the Effectiveness of Aids

from Part II - Enduring Systems of Lay Participation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 August 2021

By
Marie Comiskey
Edited by
Sanja Kutnjak Ivković ,
Shari Seidman Diamond ,
Valerie P. Hans  and
Nancy S. Marder
Sanja Kutnjak Ivković
Affiliation:
Michigan State University
Shari Seidman Diamond
Affiliation:
Northwestern University, Illinois
Valerie P. Hans
Affiliation:
Cornell University, New York
Nancy S. Marder
Affiliation:
Chicago-Kent College of Law
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Summary

This chapter examines the issue of how well Canadian jurors comprehend legal instructions and whether there are jury aids that can enhance their comprehension. It traces the design of the first study in Canada to assess the relative efficacy of two competing styles of instructions used in Canada and to compare them with the plain language criminal law instructions used in California, USA. The style that used a series of logical questions to be answered was associated with the highest levels of comprehension. The results also revealed that the type of aid provided had a modest impact on overall comprehension score and that those who received either both aids (written instructions and decision trees) or written instructions had scores that were significantly different from either those with no aid or the decision tree alone. This chapter also explores some of the challenges associated with cross-jurisdictional research. Additional studies are needed to ensure that jurors have an accurate understanding of the law and to make clear how styles of jury instruction and jury aids can impact comprehension levels.

Keywords

jury instructionsjury aidswritten instructionsdecision treeplain language instructionsCanadian juries
Type
Chapter
Information
Juries, Lay Judges, and Mixed Courts
A Global Perspective
 , pp. 174 - 194
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

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