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The Impact of Information on Death Penalty Support, RevisitedEric G. Lambert, Scott D. Camp, Alan Clarke and Shanhe Jiang

Crime & Delinquency2011 57: 572 originally published online 29 February 2008DOI: 10.1177/0011128707312147

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Article

The Impact of

Information on DeathPenalty Support,Revisited

Eric G. Lambert1, Scott D. Camp2,Alan Clarke3, andShanhe Jiang4

Crime & Delinquency57(4) 572599

The Author(s) 2011

Reprints and permission: http://www.sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav

DOI: 10.1177/0011128707312147http://cad.sagepub .com

Abstract

In 1972, former Supreme Court JusticeMarshallpostulatedthat the publicwas uninformedaboutthedeathpenaltyand informationwould change theirsupport for it. There is some indication that information about the deathpenalty may change peoples level of support.This study re-examinesdata

used by Lambertand Clarke(2001). Using multivariateanalyses, the impactthat informationhas on deathpenaltysupport is tested,along with level ofprior knowledge about the death penalty,personal characteristics (gender,age, politicalaffiliation,race,being a criminaljusticemajor,academic level), andreligious factors. The results suggest that information on both deterrenceand innocence leads to a reduction in deathpenaltysupportand views onthe death penalty. Furthermore, the results suggest that the informationpresentedmay have varyingeffectsamong differentsubgroups of people.

Keywords

death penalty attitudes, Marshall Hypotheses, capital punishment, collegestudents

1University ofToledo, Ohio2Federal Bureau of Prisons,Washington, D.C.3UtahValley State College, Orem

4University ofToledo, Ohio

CorrespondingAuthor:

Scott D.Camp, Federal Bureau of Prisons, Office of Research and Evaluation, 320 First StreetNW,400 Building, Room 3005,Washington DC 20534

Email: [email protected]
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Lambertet al. 573

Capital punishment has a long history in the United States, with a brief respite

between 1972 and 1976 when the U.S. Supreme Court declared in Furman v.

Georgia (1972) that capital punishment was unconstitutional as it was being

administered at the time. Following a 1976 U.S. Supreme Court decision

reinstating the death penalty, Gregg v. Georgia (1976), 38 states and the

federal government resumed capital punishment. Since then, more than 1,000

individuals have been executed (The Death Penalty Information Center,

2006). Today, the majority of nations no longer practice capital punishment.

Many nations have abolished capital punishment entirely, some doing so

despite widespread public support for it. At the end of 2003, 133 out of 195

countries were abolitionists or de facto abolitionists (80 completely abol-

ished capital punishment, 12 reserve the death penalty for extraordinary

crimes such as treason or war crimes, and 41 have the death penalty but have

not used it in more than 10 years). Therefore, only 62 nations use the death

penalty for civilian crimes (Hill, 2005). The United States is a retentionist

nation. In terms of the number of people executed each year, the United

States usually ranks among the top three nations with approximately 60 to 70

executions per year (Amnesty International, 2004).

There is international pressure on the United States to abolish the death

penalty, but this pressure has had little influence. Support by the majority ofU.S. citizens has helped construct a social reality that support for capital

punishment is intractable (Unnever, Cullen, & Roberts, 2005, p. 187); how-

ever, support for the death penalty is far from universal (Wilcox & Steele,

2003). Not all people support it, nor do all states use it. There are 12 abolition-

ist states. Second, the number of executions varies widely by rententionist

states. Three states have accounted for over half of all executions in the United

States since the reinstatement of capital punishment in 1976; Texas, alone, has

accounted for 35% of these executions, and four other death penalty stateshave not executed anyone since reinstatement (The Death Penalty Informa-

tion Center, 2006). Finally, there has been extensive polling during the past

70 years on thepublics level of support for capital punishment (Bohm, 1987;

Durham, Elrod, & Kinkade, 1996). Although the polling data have shown that

most U.S. citizens support the death penalty, the data also have shown that

support has varied over time (Bohm, 1992a, 1992b; Warr, 1995).

Recent polls have shown that support for the death penalty has dropped

from 80% in 1989 to about 65% in 2005 (The Death Penalty Information

Center, 2006). It has been hypothesized that the reduction in support is due in

large part to the public and media attention on people wrongly convicted and

sentenced to death (Harmon & Lofquist, 2005). Empirical findings have indi-

cated that informing people about capital punishment influences their level

of support. Justice Thurgood Marshall contended in Furman v. Georgia
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574 Crime& Delinquency57(4)

(1972) that knowledge can reshape peoples death penalty views. Justice

Marshall postulated that (a) American citizens know almost nothing about

capital punishment, and (b) if people were fully informed as to the pur-

poses of the penalty and its liabilities [they] would find the penalty shocking,

unjust, and unacceptable. These propositions are known as the Marshall

Hypotheses.

It is critical to understand whether level of support for the death penalty is

influenced by information. As Whitehead, Blankenship, and Wright (1999)

pointed out, [g]iven the literal life and death nature of capital punishment, it

is important to continue research on this topic (p. 250). Nevertheless, there

has been limited research on how the issue of innocence affects support for

capital punishment. Unnever and Cullen (2005) argued that anti-death pen-

alty advocates may possibly alter public opinion about the death penalty if

they inform the American public that carrying out the death penalty can result

in innocent people being executed (p. 25). Although there have been a few

studies examining the impact of information on death penalty support, includ-

ing the issue of innocence, this past research has tested the impact of provid-

ing information on death penalty support without controlling for the effects of

other factors. This study was a reanalysis of the data used by Lambert and

Clarke (2001). Lambert and Clarke used a convenience sample to survey selectedclasses at a Midwestern public university. They used ttests and ANOVA to

determine whether support for the death penalty was changed by providing

students with an essay about deterrence or innocence. This study built on that

work by re-examining the impact of information (i.e., the deterrence and inno-

cence essays) and determining whether the impact of this information varied

by different subgroups. Using multivariate analyses, the impact that informa-

tion had on death penalty views and support was tested while obtaining an

understanding of the effect for level of prior knowledge about the death pen-alty, personal characteristics (gender, age, political affiliation, race, being a

criminal justice major, academic level), and religious factors.

Literature Review

Although there are many reasons, the two primary reasons for supporting the

death penalty are deterrence and retribution (Bohm, 1992a; Bohm & Vogel,

1994; Ellsworth & Gross, 1994; Ellsworth & Ross, 1983; Warr & Stafford,

1984). Deterrence is the ideology that society can stop crime by making pun-

ishment more severe than the benefits gained from criminal acts. By making

examples of criminal offenders, the deterrence ideology holds that other

people will learn not to commit crime, unless they wish to face the same harsh

sentence meted out to the offender (Lambert, Clarke, & Lambert, 2004).
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Lambertet al. 575

Deterrence is a common reason provided by death penalty proponents of why

they support capital punishment (Ellsworth & Gross, 1994; Steele & Wilcox,

2003; Thomas, 1977; Zeisel & Gallup, 1989). Many supporters of the death

penalty argue that executing murderers deters others from committing murder

(Ellsworth & Gross, 1994; Fagan, 1986; Vidmar & Ellsworth, 1974; Whitehead

& Blankenship, 2000; Zeisel & Gallup, 1989). When asked to select between

supporting capital punishment for deterrence or retribution reasons, Tyler

and Weber (1982) found that 63% of those surveyed picked deterrence. In a

survey of Tennessee residents, about 40% of the respondents indicated that

they felt that the death penalty deterred people from committing murder

(Whitehead & Blankenship, 2000).

Although many people support the death penalty because they feel that it

deters others, the research to date strongly indicates that capital punishment

has little, if any, deterrent effect on violent crime, including murder (Bailey,

1990, 1991; Paternoster, 1991; Radelet & Akers, 1996). Zeisel and Gallup

(1989) found that 71% supported capital punishment, but only 55% indicated

that they would still support the death penalty if they were shown that it had

no deterrent effect on murder. Although not a direct test, the poll results sug-

gest that support for capital punishment would drop when people are pro-

vided evidence about the lack of a deterrent effect. Finally, the research findingssuggest that the death penalty may in some cases lead to increased violence.

This effect is called the brutalization effect in the literature (Bailey, 1983;

Bowers, 1984; Radelet & Akers, 1996).

Retribution is a desire to punish the wrongdoer for his or her actions.

Although retribution is a complex punishment ideology, the basic idea is that

offenders are punished for the harm they caused in proportion to the damages

created by their criminal acts (Bohm, 1992a; Finckenauer, 1988). Retribution

is founded on the principle oflex talionis, which holds that the punishmentmust fit the crime. Many proponents argue that murderers deserve to be exe-

cuted because they took the life of another human being. The literature indi-

cates that retribution is frequently cited by people as their reason for supporting

the death penalty (Ellsworth & Gross, 1994; Firment & Geiselman, 1997;

Warr & Stafford, 1984; Whitehead & Blankenship, 2000; Zeisel & Gallup,

1989). Individuals who support the retributive ideology are generally higher

in their level of support for the death penalty (Warr & Stafford, 1984).

Under the logic of retribution, it is necessary to sentence only guilty peo-

ple to death. Executing an innocent person violates the principle of retribu-

tion (Lempert, 1981). As Unnever and Cullen (2005) pointed out, the death

penalty is the most definitive punishment because there is no remedy for

executing innocent individuals (p. 5). Moreover, they went on to contend,

The power of the wrongful execution argument is that it threatens the
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legitimacy of retribution: How is a system just and principled if its process

inevitably executes people who have done nothing wrong? (p. 31). Thus, the

retribution argument for capital punishment is vulnerable to evidence that

innocent parties are sentenced to death as well as indirect and direct evidence

that support for the death penalty is challenged by such revelations.

There is strong evidence that a sizable number of innocent individuals

have been sentenced to death (Huff, 2002, 2004; Liebman, 2002; Radelet,

Bedau, & Putman, 1992; Radelet, Lofquist, & Bedau, 1996; Weinstock &

Schwartz, 1998). In the past 20 years, more than 120 wrongly convicted indi-

viduals have been exonerated and released from death row (The Death Penalty

Information Center, 2006). These exonerated individuals correspond to approx-

imately 3% of the death row population, and they often represent people who

had definitive proof of their innocence. The overall rate of wrongful convic-

tion is almost certainly higher. Many of these wrongful convictions were

overturned due to DNA evidence (Clarke, Lambert, & Whitt, 2001; Huff,

2004). Pasupuleti, Lambert, and Cluse-Tolar (2005) pointed out that the

introduction of DNA testing has helped reshape the debate on capital punish-

ment by adding validity to the argument that many innocent persons have

been sentenced to death (p. 12).

Because of the significant increase in the number of exonerations in thepast 10 years, there have been questions on the acceptability of capital pun-

ishment (Huff, 2002, 2004). Harmon and Lofquist (2005) argued that the

reduction in capital punishment support in national polls from the early 1990s

to 2004 was due in large part to the public and media attention of people

wrongly sentenced to death (also see Longmire, 1996). Likewise, Fan, Keltner,

and Wyatt (2002) argued that national support for the death penalty has declined

in the past decade in part because of the increased coverage of people being

released from death row.Bobo and Johnson (2004) provided an indirect test of this hypothesis.

They conducted a study in which a subset of survey respondents were pre-

sented with information that many people had been released from death row

because they were later found to be innocent. All respondents were asked

whether they would vote for a gubernatorial candidate who was opposed to

capital punishment because of the risk of executing innocent individuals.

Those presented the information on the number of innocent people sentenced

to death were more likely to vote for the candidate. Using Gallup survey data,

Unnever and Cullen (2005) found that those who believed that an innocent

person had been executed during the past 5 years were less likely to support

the death penalty. However, the results of the two studies were produced with

cross-sectional surveys, and the causal ordering could not be established.
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Lambertet al. 577

Unnever and Cullen (2005) admitted that we cannot rule out the possibility

that part of the wrongful executionscapital punishment support relationship

is because those who oppose the death penalty are more likely to form

beliefssuch that innocent people are executedthat justify their death pen-

alty sentiments (and not vice versa) (p. 25).

A few studies have directly tested the impact of providing information on

peoples support for capital punishment. One of the earliest tests was done by

Sarat and Vidmar (1976). A small sample read one of four essaysone on

the lack of deterrence, one on the unfair administration, a combination of both,

and a control essay. The authors found that death penalty support dropped

among all groups except the one that read the control essay. Vidmar and

Dittenhoffer (1981) studied 39 undergraduate students at a Canadian univer-

sity to determine whether information about the death penalty influenced

their level of support. The participants in the experimental group (n = 21)were required to read a 3,500-word essay on capital punishment and deter-

rence, utilitarian, moral, religious, and judicial administration issues. They

were also provided with supplemental readings on reserve at the university

library covering capital punishment issues. There was a substantial decline in

support for the death penalty among the students in the experimental group

but not in the control group.Bohm (1989) measured the death penalty views of students at a U.S.

Southern university before and after a 4-week death penalty class. A reduction

in support for capital punishment was observed at the end of the class. In an

expanded study, Bohm (1991) again reported that there was a small decrease

in level of support among students who took a death penalty course but not

among those who took a nondeath penalty class. In another study of 38 stu-

dents in a death penalty course and 68 students in an introductory criminal

justice class, Wright, Bohm, and Jamieson (1995) observed that there was nostatistically significant drop in death penalty support among either group of

students. Among 23 criminal justice majors in a special topics class on the

death penalty at a Midwestern university, it was observed that by the end of

the class, there was a large drop in support for capital punishment (Sandys,

1995). Specifically, support for the death penalty dropped from 70% to 45%.

Lambert and Clarke (2001), in another direct study, undertook a study to

determine the impact of reading information on death penalty support among

730 students at a Midwestern university. Using bivariate-paired ttests, they

found that there was a statistically significant drop in support for capital pun-

ishment among those who read the deterrence or the innocence essays, but

there was no drop among those who read the control essay.

The aforementioned direct studies lend support for the postulation that

information can change death penalty support. Nevertheless, all of the direct
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studies suffer from one common shortcoming. They used before and after

bivariate tests. Gender, age, political affiliation, race, being a criminal justice

major, level of education, frequency of religious attendance, religious oppo-

sition to the death penalty, and knowledge of death penalty issues are all

associated with level of support for capital punishment. It is not fully known

whether information about the lack of deterrent effect and the issue of inno-

cence will vary by these various subgroups. It is important to see how infor-

mation influences the death penalty support among various different groups

of people and if some groups of people are more acceptable to change than

other groups of people.

Men are generally more likely than women to support the death penalty

(Applegate, Cullen, Fisher, & Vander Ven, 2000; Bohm, 1991; Durham et al.,

1996; Robbers, 2004; Sandys & McGarrell, 1995; Soss, Langbein, &

Metelko, 2003; Stack, 2000; Unnever & Cullen, 2006; Vogel & Vogel, 2003;

Whitehead & Blankenship, 2000). Age has been found to be positively asso-

ciated with death penalty views (Bohm, 1987; Fox, Radelet, & Bonsteel,

1991; Unnever & Cullen, 2005), with older individuals much more likely to

support the death penalty. Political orientation has been linked with capital

punishment support (Unnever & Cullen, 2006), with conservatives and

Republicans being higher in their level of support than liberals and Demo-crats (Bohm, 1991; Boots, Heide, & Cochran, 2004; Britt, 1998; Cochran,

Boots, & Heide, 2003; Fox et al., 1991; Grasmick, Cochran, Bursik, & Kimpel,

1993; Sandys & McGarrell, 1995; Stack, 2000; Vogel & Vogel, 2003). White

persons have been found to be more likely than Nonwhite persons to support

capital punishment (Baker, Lambert, & Jenkins, 2005; Bobo & Johnson,

2004; Bohm, 1991; Boots et al., 2004; Cochran et al., 2003; Robbers, 2004;

Soss et al., 2003; Unnever et al., 2005; Vogel & Vogel, 2003; Young, 1991,

1992, 2004). Research indicates that criminal justice majors are more sup-portive of the death penalty than students in other majors are (Farnworth,

Longmire, & West, 1998; Mackey & Courtright, 2000). Educational level

has been found to be inversely related to capital punishment support (Britt,

1998; Grasmick & McGill, 1994; Halim & Stiles, 2001; Payne, Gainey,

Triplett, & Danner, 2004; Stack, 2003; Tyler & Boeckmann, 1997; Young,

1991). Frequency of religious attendance has been inversely linked with sup-

port for capital punishment (Grasmick et al., 1993; Grasmick & McGill,

1994; Perl & McClintock, 2001; Unnever & Cullen, 2005). Those who

belong to a religious faith that is opposed to capital punishment tend to be

lower in their support than those who belong to a faith that advocates for the

death penalty (Grasmick et al., 1993; Young, 1992).

Although these above characteristics have been linked to level of support

or opposition, it is unclear whether these characteristics moderate the impact
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Lambertet al. 579

that information has on death penalty views. It is important to discover

whether information can change death penalty attitudes and also whether the

effects of information differ by subgroup. It is possible that some subgroups

may be more open to change while others are more resistant to the effects of

information changing their death penalty views. There has been little research

on how information influences the death penalty support among different

groups of people. Therefore, the aforementioned characteristics were included

as exploratory variables in this study. Finally, a critical factor that has not

been controlled is the degree of accurate knowledge about salient death pen-

alty facts and issues. If information is important in shaping a persons level

of support for capital punishment, it is important to control for the prior level

of knowledge about death penalty issues.

As previously indicated, this study builds on the work of Lambert and

Clarke (2001) by re-examining the impact of information (i.e., the deterrence

and innocence essays) while controlling for level of knowledge about the

death penalty. Using multivariate analyses, the impact of information on

death penalty support was tested while controlling for level of prior knowl-

edge about the death penalty and determining whether the effects varied by

personal characteristics (gender, age, political affiliation, race, major, academic

level) and religious factors.

Data and Method

The data used in the present study were taken from a survey given to students

at a 4-year, public university in Michigan (Lambert & Clarke, 2001). The

students were selected from 24 academic courses in criminal justice, general

education in the social sciences, and general English education. The courses

ranged in size between 15 and 30 students. Students were given class time tocomplete the survey on a voluntary basis. Approximately 90% of students

agreed to participate and 747 surveys were collected, although 17 surveys

were dropped due to missing data on the death penalty questions, resulting in

730 surveys used in this study. In the first section of the survey, students were

asked for general background information as well as their views on the death

penalty and their knowledge about capital punishment issues. The second

section of the survey was composed of a short essay that could be read in

approximately 10 minutes. The students randomly received an essay on either

the general lack of a deterrence effect for the death penalty, the possibility

and frequency with which innocent individuals are sentenced to death, or a

control essay about the general reasons for punishing criminals. The essays

were used in other studies assessing whether increased knowledge about the
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death penalty altered support for the death penalty (Lambert & Clarke, 2001;

Sarat & Vidmar, 1976; Vidmar & Dittenhoffer, 1981). Following the survey,

students were asked to report what changes, if any, occurred in their views

about the death penalty, the deterrence effect of capital punishment, the pos-

sibility of sentencing innocent individuals to death, and their level of support

for the death penalty.

The nonrandom convenience design of the survey administration negates

the ability to generalize results. However, the purpose of the research design

was to determine whether it was possible to change opinions about the death

penalty, at least in the short run, after providing a stimulus, in this case an

informational essay. As such, the current study is more in the line of experi-

mental research on sample volunteers rather than traditional survey research

in which estimation of a population parameter is paramount. In the current

context, the analyses of significance are better thought of as indicators of

reliable results (size of the parameter to the standard error) rather than tradi-

tional tests of statistical significance.

Three key hypotheses were tested with the data at hand. The first hypoth-

esis was that increased information about the death penalty would lower sup-

port for the death penalty, whether this information comes in the form of

additional information about the lack of a deterrence effect of the death pen-alty or additional information about the possibility of sentencing innocent par-

ties to death. The second hypothesis was that attitudes about the deterrence

effect of the death penalty would be influenced by additional information on

the deterrence effect of the death penalty but not by additional information on

the likelihood of sentencing an innocent person to death. Finally, the third

hypothesis was that attitudes about the likelihood of sentencing an innocent

person to death would be altered by additional information on this topic but

not by additional information on the deterrence effect of the death penalty.Pre-existing knowledge of the death penalty was included as a control

variable in the analysis. Gender of the respondent, political orientation, race,

religious views, major in college, and college class standing were included in

the analysis to determine whether the effects of the information varied by

these different subgroups.

Four variables from the survey were used as outcome variables in the

analyses. The variables were asked immediately after the respondent had

read the control, deterrence, or innocence essay. The first question asked

respondents, After reading the essay, has your view of the death penalty

changed? Two other questions, one asking about change to views on deter-

rence and the other querying about alterations in perceptions about the

chances that an innocent person could be sentenced to death, are secondary.
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Lambertet al. 581

These two questions asked, After reading the essay, has your view of the

deterrent effect of the death penalty changed? and Afterreading the essay,

has your view of the chances of sentencing an innocent person to death

changed? All three questions have three potential answers: changed a great

deal, changed somewhat, and did not change at all. As discussed in the

next section, the two change categories were collapsed together and a logistic

regression analysis was performed to uncover the factors associated with

those who changed their views. The final variable measured whether there

was a reduction in support for the death penalty after reading the provided

essay. Before and after the reading of the essays, respondents were asked to

mark one of seven boxes reflecting their level of support for capital punish-

ment. The responses were very strongly support,strongly support,some-

what support,uncertain,somewhat oppose, strongly oppose, and very

strongly oppose. On this identical question about death penalty support

asked before and after reading the essays, 25 respondents indicated a higher

level of support for the death penalty after reading the essay. In contrast, 205

had less support for the death penalty after reading the essay and the remain-

ing respondents had no change in the level of support. Respondents who had

a decrease in support after reading the assigned essay were coded as 1 and

those who had no change in level of support or who had an increase in sup-port were coded as 0.1 It was decided to use this coding scheme, because the

vast majority of those who reported a change in level of support had a one-

unit drop (e.g., strongly support to somewhat support). Specifically,

among the 205 who reported a decrease, 70% reported a one-unit drop, 25%

a two-unit drop, and 5% a three-unit (or more) drop. As with the other out-

come variables, a logistic regression analysis was performed to determine

what factors were associated with those who had a reduction in the level of

their support for the death penalty after reading the assigned essay. The independent variables used in this analysis included one scale. A scale

was computed for knowledge of the issues surrounding the death penalty.

The scale was computed as a simple sum of 16 questions that had right or

wrong responses associated with them. For example, respondents were asked

to choose whether they agreed with the statement, It costs more to incarcer-

ate someone for life without parole for the crime of murder than it does to

execute the person. A complete list of the questions is provided in the appen-

dix in Lambert and Clarke, 2001. The scale had a Cronbachs alpha value of

.73, an acceptable degree of consistency and reliability.

The other independent variables measured gender of the respondent (the

effect of being female), political party (dummy variables were created for

Democrats and Independents, with Republicans serving as the comparison
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group), race (Whites were compared to Nonwhites),2 whether the respondent

majored in criminal justice, whether the respondent was an upper-level

undergraduate student, which type of essay was read (dummy variables were

created to compare those who read the deterrence and innocence essays to the

control essay readers), religious attendance, and whether the respondent had

no religious reasons to oppose the death penalty. The religious attendance

variable was assumed to act in a linear fashion in the model even though

technically the variable was only measured on an ordinal scale. The catego-

ries for this variable were almost never, once a month, two or three

times a month,once a week, and more than once a week. The categories

were coded to reflect more frequent attendance.

All four outcome variables were analyzed with logistic regression. The

outcome variables were categorized to compare those who changed their views

to those who did not. Model fit was assessed with the Hosmer-Lemeshow Test

and the area under the receiveroperator curve.

Findings

Descriptive statistics for the variables used in the analyses are provided in

Table 1. Many of the variables were dummy coded. The means reportedfor dummy variables give the proportion of respondents with a value of 1.

For example, nearly 33% of respondents had a change of heart regarding

the death penalty after reading the essays. For the outcome variables

whether beliefs about the deterrent effect of the death penalty changed and

whether beliefs about the possibility that an innocent person could be sen-

tenced to death changed, the respective percentages were 35.9% and

38.9%. For the measure whether there was a drop in support in the death

penalty, the percentage was 28.1%. For the covariates used in the models,44.9% of the respondents were female, and the average age was 21.9

years. A scale measuring the number of known facts about the death pen-

alty, in which 16 was the maximum possible score, had an average value

of 6.5. For political affiliation, 31.9% of the respondents identified them-

selves as Democrats, and 42.3% of the respondents listed themselves as

Independents. Most of the respondents, 76.8%, were White, and 45.2% of

the respondents were criminal justice majors. Slightly over half (51.5%) of

the students were upper level. The split in who read the control, deter-

rence, and innocence essays reflected the design of the study, as 33% of

the students read each of the essay types. The average religious attendance

was a little over 2, where 2 represented once a month. The vast majority of

respondents, 82.6%, had no religious basis for opposing the death penalty.
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Lambertet al. 583

Table 1. Descriptive Statistics forVariables Used in Analysis

Variable N M SD Min Max

Change in attitude toward the 730 0.329 0.470 0 1death penaltya

Change in attitude toward the 730 0.359 0.480 0 1deterrent effecta

Change in attitude toward the 730 0.389 0.488 0 1innocent sentenceda

Change in death penalty supporta 730 0.281 0.450 0 1Female (male ref)a 730 0.449 0.498 0 1Age 728 21.942 3.577 18 48

Knowledge of Death Penalty Scale 729 6.499 3.276 0 15Democrat (Republican ref)a 730 0.319 0.466 0 1Independent (Republican ref)a 730 0.423 0.494 0 1White (Nonwhite ref)a 730 0.768 0.422 0 1Criminal justice major 730 0.452 0.498 0 1

(Noncriminal justice ref)aUpper level (lower level ref)a 730 0.515 0.500 0 1Deterrenceessay (control ref)a 730 0.333 0.472 0 1Innocent person essay (Control ref)a 730 0.336 0.472 0 1

Religious attendance 729 2.042 1.218 1 5No religiousopposition (1 = yes) 730 0.826 0.540 0 3

Note: Ref = referencegroup.a.Mean of a dummy variablecoded 0 and 1 is the proportion of respondents with a value of 1.

There was only an 11% decrease in death penalty support after reading the

control essay. Forty percent of those who were assigned the deterrence

essay reported a decline in death penalty support, with most (87%) report-

ing a one-unit decrease (e.g., strongly support to somewhat support).Among those who read the innocence essay, 38% reported a reduction in

support for capital punishment, and there was an even split between those

who reported a unit decrease versus those who reported a two-unit

decrease. Among those who had a decrease in their level of support, 47%

had a one-unit decrease, 46% had a two-unit decrease, and 7% had a three-

or more unit decrease.

The logistic regression outcome variable whether the respondent reported

that their support for the death penalty changed after reading one of the essaysis reported in Table 2. The responses were changed a great deal, somewhat, or

not at all after reading the essay. The most often selected answer was not at

all (N= 490), but there were sufficient numbers of people who checked agreat deal (N= 26) or somewhat (N= 214) to analyze. However, because
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Table 2. Logistic Regression Predicting Change in Attitude About Death Penalty

Variable Coefficient Odds Ratio SE Z p> |z|

Female (male ref) 0.109 1.116 0.218 0.56 0.575Age -0.137 0.872 0.042 -2.83 0.005Knowledge of Death -0.173 0.841 0.0273 -5.34 0.000

Penalty ScaleDemocrat (Republican ref) 0.193 1.213 0.3251 0.72 0.471Independent (Republican ref) 0.191 1.211 0.2840 0.82 0.415White (Nonwhite reference) -0.774 0.461 0.1106 -3.23 0.001Criminal justice major -0.154 0.857 0.1759 -0.75 0.452

(noncriminal justice ref)

Upper level (lower level ref) 0.498 1.646 0.3999 2.05 0.040Deterrenceessay (control ref) 2.340 10.38 2.9545 8.22 0.000Innocent person essay 2.352 10.50 2.9772 8.30 0.000

(control ref)Religious attendance 0.147 1.158 0.0971 1.75 0.079No religious opposition 0.199 1.220 0.2313 1.05 0.079

(1 = yes)Constant 1.413 1.0858 0.30 0.193

Note: Ref = referencegroup. Individuals who were strongly opposed to death penalty beforereadingessay were excluded from the analysis; Number of observations: 654; Likelihood Ratio2 (12) Test of Model Fit: 173.26; Prob > 2 = 0.000; Pseudo R2 = .203; Hosmer-Lemeshow Testof goodness of fit: 2 (628) = 685.59; Prob > 2 = 0.055;Area under ROC curve = 0.796.

the number of people choosing a great deal of change was small, they were

collapsed into a category with changed somewhat, and a logistic regression

was performed to determine which factors influenced change. Adding the two

categories together, nearly 33% of the respondents claimed that their attitudes

toward the death penalty changed. Results for the logistic regression analysispredicting these changes are presented in Table 2.

The results in Table 2 demonstrate that several variables were associated

with a lack of change in a statistically significant fashion. Older students,

White students, and students who were more knowledgeable about death

penalty issues were less likely to report change. The odds of reporting

change in attitudes about the death penalty were approximately 13% lower

for an additional year of age among the respondents with all other factors

being held constant. White students had odds of changing their views on

the death penalty that were 54% lower than non-White students, and for an

additional correct answer on the death penalty knowledge scale, respon-

dents were about 16% less likely to change their attitude. On the other

hand, upper-level (i.e., senior and junior) students were more likely than
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Lambertet al. 585

lower-level (i.e., freshman and sophomore) students to report a change after

reading the assigned essay. Specifically, upper-level students were approx-

imately 65% more likely to report that their views of the death penalty

changed. The results in Table 2 also suggest that students who read the

deterrence and innocence essays were more likely to change their position

than the control group. The results for change among the students who read the

deterrence and innocence essays were quite strong. Students who read the

deterrence essay were 938% more likely to change their opinions than stu-

dents who read the control essay, and students who read the innocence essay

were 950% more likely to change their views.3 Religious attendance and

the no religious objection variables were marginally significant (p .10).

Individuals with an additional unit of religious attendance had odds of

changing their views toward the death penalty that were 16% higher. Like-

wise, students without a built-in religious objection to the death penalty

had odds of change that were 22% higher.

The fit of the model was acceptable. The Hosmer-Lemeshow Test showed

that the observed responses did not differ from the expected responses in a

statistically significant fashion. However, the p value of .055 showed that

the difference approached statistical significance. The ROC (response

operator curve) value was 0.796, which is over 0.7, the typical cutoff valuefor acceptability. A value of 1 is the maximum possible ROC score, and a

value of .50 indicates that a model does no better than chance in predicting

the outcome.

Two other models were examined in this analysis to test derivative hypoth-

eses about the effects of knowledge on attitudes toward the death penalty.

The first model examined changes in perceptions about the deterrent effect of

the death penalty reported after reading the respective essays, and the other

was for whether the respondents views about the chance of sentencing aninnocent person had changed. Again, respondents noted that their attitudes

changed a great deal,changedsomewhat, or did not change at all. The

changed a great deal and changed somewhat categories were collapsed

together and compared to the did not change at all category in a binary

logistic regression analysis.

The results for changes in attitude about the deterrent effect of the death

penalty are presented in Table 3. Respondents who had a more thorough

understanding of death penalty issues and who were upper-level undergradu-

ates were less likely to change their views about the deterrent effect of the

death penalty. Those respondents who answered one additional question cor-

rectly had odds of change that were 14.6% lower, and upper-level students

had odds that were 35.3% lower. On the other hand, several factors made
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Table 3. Logistic Regression of Change in Belief About Deterrent Effect of DeathPenalty


Female (male ref) 0.329 1.390 0.261 1.75 0.080Age -0.016 0.984 0.031 -0.51 0.609Knowledge of Death -0.158 0.854 0.026 -5.08 0.000

Penalty ScaleDemocrat (Republican ref) 0.333 1.394 0.358 1.30 0.192Independent (Republican ref) -0.248 0.780 0.178 -1.09 0.277White (Nonwhite reference) 0.097 1.102 0.256 0.42 0.677Criminal justice major 0.018 1.018 0.203 0.09 0.929

(non

criminal justice ref)Upper level (lower level ref) -0.435 0.647 0.138 -2.03 0.042Deterrenceessay (control ref) 2.052 7.780 1.836 8.70 0.000Innocent person essay 0.564 1.757 0.406 2.44 0.015


(1 = yes)Constant -0.511 0.759 -0.67 0.501

Note: Ref = referencegroup. Individuals who were strongly opposed to death penalty beforereadingessay were excluded from the analysis; Number of observations: 654; Likelihood Ratio2 (12)Test of Model Fit: 143.21; Prob > 2 = 0.000; Pseudo R2 = .164; Hosmer-Lemeshow Testof goodness of fit: 2 (628) = 648.37; Prob > 2 = 0.278;Area under ROC curve = 0.762.

students more likely to change their views, including having read the deter-

rence essay and having read the innocence essay. Having read the deterrence

essay produced a much larger effect than the innocence essay as deterrencereaders had odds that were 678% greater than control essay readers. The com-

parable number for innocence essay readers was only 75.7%. Gender and

religious attendance had marginally significant effects (p .10). Those

respondents with an additional unit of religious attendance were 14.4% more

likely to change their view about the deterrent effect of the death penalty.

Women were about 39% more likely to change their view about the deterrent

effect of the death penalty after reading the assigned essay.

The fit statistics for this model did not suggest any problem of fit between

the expected and observed data. The Hosmer-Lemeshow significance level of

0.278 suggested that the model reproduced the observed predicted probabili-

ties adequately. Likewise, the ROC value of 0.762 implied an adequate fit

with the model used.
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Lambertet al. 587

Table 4. Logistic Regression of Change in Belief About Sentencing an InnocentParty


Female (Male ref) 0.155 1.168 0.220 0.82 0.410Age -0.017 0.983 0.030 -0.55 0.583Knowledge of Death -0.092 0.912 0.027 -3.07 0.002

Penalty ScaleDemocrat (Republican ref) 0.188 1.206 0.310 0.73 0.466Independent (Republican ref) -0.097 0.908 0.205 -0.43 0.668White (Nonwhite ref) 0.068 1.071 0.254 0.29 0.773Criminal justice major 0.435 1.546 0.318 2.12 0.034

(noncriminal justice ref)Upper level (lower level ref) -0.256 0.774 0.170 -1.16 0.245Deterrenceessay (control ref) -0.355 0.701 0.161 -1.55 0.122Innocent person essay 1.991 7.324 1.627 8.96 0.000

(control ref)Religious attendance 0.210 1.234 0.099 2.63 0.009No religious opposition -0.144 0.866 0.154 -0.81 0.419

(1 = yes)Constant -0.515 0.753 -0.68 0.494

Note: Ref = referencegroup. Individuals who were strongly opposed to death penalty beforereadingessay were excluded from the analysis; Number of observations: 654; Likelihood Ratio2 (12)Test of Model Fit: 160.83; Prob > 2 = 0.000; Pseudo R2 = .181; Hosmer-Lemeshow Testof goodness of fit: 2 (628) = 656.99; Prob > 2 = 0.205;Area under ROC curve = 0.773.

The findings for the variable measuring change in views about the possi-

bility of sentencing an innocent party are presented in Table 4. More knowl-

edgeable respondents (odds were 8.8% lower for an additional question correct)were less likely to change their view about an innocent person being sen-

tenced. Where both the deterrence essay and innocence essay groups differed

from the control group for the prior question, only the innocence essay group

differed for this outcome. Respondents who read the innocence essay had

odds of change 632% higher than respondents who read the control essay.

Religious attendance had a statistically significant association. Those respon-

dents with an additional unit of religious attendance were 23.4% more likely

to change their view about the chances of sentencing an innocent person to

death penalty. This is the only model for which criminal justice majors dif-

fered from other college majors. Criminal justice majors were more likely to

report that their attitudes changed regarding the likelihood of sentencing an
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Table 5. Logistic Regression of Decrease or Not in Level of Death Penalty SupportAfter Reading the Assigned Essay


Female (male ref) -0.124 0.884 0.436 0.08 0.777Age -0.086 0.918 0.110 0.60 0.438Knowledge of Death -0.051 0.950 0.073 0.49 0.482

Penalty ScaleDemocrat (Republican ref) -0.365 0.694 0.630 0.34 0.562Independent (Republican ref) 0.363 1.437 0.582 0.39 0.533White (Nonwhite ref) -1.280 0.278 0.500 6.56 0.010Criminal justice major 0.070 1.073 0.452 0.24 0.876

(non

criminal justice ref)Upper level (lower level ref) 0.648 1.911 1.911 1.52 0.218Deterrenceessay (control ref) 2.061 7.857 0.588 12.31 0.000Innocent person essay 1.763 5.831 0.515 8.21 0.004


(1 = yes)Constant 0.435 2.463 0.03 0.860

Note: Ref = referencegroup. Individuals who were strongly opposed to death penalty beforereadingessay were excluded from the analysis; Number of observations: 657; Likelihood Ratio2 (12) Test of Model Fit: 149.00; Prob > 2 = 0.000; Pseudo R2 = 0.319; Hosmer-LemeshowTest of goodness of fit: 2 (628) = 696.879; Prob > 2 = 0.081;Area under ROC curve = 0.876.

innocent person to the death penalty. The odds of change in view about inno-

cence for criminal justice majors were 54.6% higher.

The fit statistics implied that the model was adequate for this outcomemeasure. The Hosmer-Lemeshow statistic had a probability of 0.205, and

this suggests that the model reproduced the structure of the observed data.

Likewise, the ROC value of .773 was acceptable.

The final model estimated was to determine whether there was a decrease

in the level of support for capital punishment after reading the assigned essay,

and the results for this model are reported in Table 5. Race and the type of

essay read were the only variables to have a statistically significant associa-

tion. White respondents were 72.2% less likely than non-White respondents

to have reported a decrease in level of support for capital punishment. Those

who read the deterrence essay were 686% were more likely to have reported

a decline in death penalty support than were those who read the control essay.
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