Journal of Criminal Justice 33 (2005) 573 – 584
Can information change public opinion? Another test of
the Marshall hypotheses
John K. Cochran a,*, Mitchell B. Chamlin b
a
Department of Criminology, University of South Florida, 4202 E. Fowler Ave., SOC107, Tampa, FL 33620-8100, United States
b
Division of Criminal Justice, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio 45221-0389, United States
Abstract
U.S. Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall offered his opinion regarding the utility of public opinion polls as a tool for
assessing the bevolving standards of decencyQ regarding capital punishment. His arguments became known as the Marshall
hypotheses and spawned a considerable body of empirical testing. The three Marshall hypotheses are: (1) support for capital
punishment is inversely associated with knowledge about it, (2) exposure to information about capital punishment produces
sentiments in opposition to capital punishment, but (3) exposure to information about capital punishment will have no impact on
those who support it for retributive reasons. The results of previous tests of these hypotheses were somewhat mixed but supportive.
None of these studies, however, examined the effects of change in knowledge levels with changes, if any, in death penalty attitudes
and beliefs as needed for a more complete test of the Marshall hypotheses. The present study addressed this shortcoming. The
results provided mixed support for these three hypotheses. That is, death penalty supporters were somewhat less informed than
death penalty opponents; exposure to death penalty information and knowledge gains tended to be associated with attitudinal
change in a directions suggested by these hypotheses; but, retributivists’ attitudes toward and beliefs about capital punishment were
not any more resistant to change than were the attitudes and beliefs of non-retributivists.
D 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Introduction
Bohm (1998, 2003a) asserted that capital punishment continues to exist in the United States primarily
because public opinion was so strongly supportive of it;
national opinion polls conducted since the early 1970s
consistently revealed that approximately 70 percent (60
to 80 percent) of adult Americans supported capital
punishment in general. He argued that there were at
least five ways in which the strong public support for
capital punishment contributed to its continued use.
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 813 974 9569; fax: +1 813 974
2803.
E-mail address: [email protected] (J.K. Cochran).
0047-2352/$ - see front matter D 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.jcrimjus.2005.08.006
First, legislators were unlikely to be swayed against
the death penalty if the majority of their constituency
supported it. Second, strong public support for capital
punishment might influence prosecutorial discretion to
seek the death penalty more frequently; perhaps even in
cases they would otherwise be disinclined from doing
so. Third, trial judges might feel pressured to impose
death sentences even when it might not be appropriate
and appellate judges might feel pressured to uphold
these sentences due to their perceptions of strong public
support. Fourth, governors might be more inclined to
support death penalty legislation and sign execution
warrants and less inclined to consider commutations
and pardons for death row inmates if they perceived
strong public support for capital punishment. Finally,
and perhaps most importantly, strong public support for
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J.K. Cochran, M.B. Chamlin / Journal of Criminal Justice 33 (2005) 573–584
capital punishment might be used by justices of state
supreme courts and the U.S. Supreme Court as an
indicator of bthe evolving standards of decencyQ when
determining whether or not the death penalty violated
constitutional safeguards against bcruel and unusual
punishment.Q
It was this fifth and final argument that fueled the
present research, for the U.S. Supreme Court did cite
declines in public support for capital punishment during the 1950s and 1960s in its landmark decision in
Furman v. Georgia (1972, p. 329) invalidating all
capital punishment statutes across the country. As
Bohm (2003a, p. 34) pointed out, public opinion polling prior to the Furman decision was quite crude and
simplistic and had undergone very little scrutiny. In
fact, the published results of these polls were generally
accepted as accurate indicators of public sentiment.
One of the first to critique these figures was Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall. Marshall emphasized the importance of public opinion as a direct
indicator of the bevolving standards of decencyQ necessary to assess the constitutionality of capital punishment under the Eighth Amendment. Marshall noted
that a punishment was invalid if bpopular sentiment
abhors itQ (Furman v. Georgia, 1972, p. 332) and that
b[i]t is imperative for constitutional purposes to attempt to discern the probable opinion of an informed
electorateQ (Furman v. Georgia, 1972, p. 362, fn.145).
He stressed, however, that the probative value of
public sentiment regarding capital punishment was
limited only to an informed or knowledgeable opinion.
Marshall asserted that support for capital punishment
was largely a function of a lack of knowledge or
information about it, but, if fully informed, bthe
great mass of citizens would conclude ... that the
death penalty is immoral and unconstitutionalQ (Furman v. Georgia, 1972, p. 363; c.f., Justice Powell’s
dissent in Furman, 1972, pp. 430–446). Marshall
acknowledged one exception to this assumption; for
those who supported capital punishment under a retributive rationale, information about capital punishment would not be persuasive (Furman v. Georgia,
1972, p. 363).
Justice Marshall’s assertions regarding the effects of
information on public support for the death penalty
opened a new line of social science inquiry and spurned
a flurry of empirical investigations of what are referred
to as the bMarshall hypotheses.Q These hypotheses are as
follows: (1) support for capital punishment is inversely
associated with knowledge about it, (2) exposure to
information about capital punishment produces sentiments in opposition to capital punishment, but (3) expo-
sure to information about capital punishment will have
no impact on those who support it for retributive reasons.
To date, there were at least eighteen published studies that tested one or more of these hypotheses (Bohm,
1989, 1990; Bohm, Clark, & Aveni, 1990, 1991; Bohm
& Vogel, 1991, 1994, 2002; Bohm, Vogel, & Maisto,
1993; Clarke, Lambert, & Whitt, 2001; Ellsworth &
Ross, 1983; Lambert & Clarke, 2001; Longmire, 1996;
Lord, Ross, & Lepper, 1979; Patenaude, 2001; Sandys,
1995; Sarat & Vidmar, 1976; Vidmar & Dittenhoffer,
1981; Wright, Bohm, & Jamieson, 1995). Bohm (1998,
1999, 2003a, 2003b) provided excellent and thorough
reviews of this body of research, thus, the authors
elected to use a simple description and summary of
the common methodology employed and the key findings to emerge.
While there were important variations in methodology across these studies, they tended to share several
common methodological elements: (1) a pretest measure of attitudes toward capital punishment, (2) exposure to information about capital punishment, and (3) a
post-test measure of death penalty attitudes. Sometimes
a one-group pretest-post-test design was employed,
more commonly a treatment (informed) group was
compared experimentally to a randomly assigned control group or quasi-experimentally to a nonequivalent
comparison group. Most typically the subjects were
undergraduate college students. The studies also tended
to vary in both the quantity and quality of the exposure
to capital punishment information.
Despite the similarities and differences in methodology, these studies tended to find somewhat mixed
though relatively consistent support for the three Marshall hypotheses. That is, informed opinion was less
supportive of capital punishment; exposure to information tended to reduce support for capital punishment;
and retributivists tended to be immune to the effects of
information about capital punishment. Additional findings common to this body of research included: (1)
exposure to information might polarize opinion, (2)
death penalty sentiments which had been publicly
pronounced were more resistant to change, (3) initial
beliefs about the death penalty such as its general
deterrent effect or marginal incapacitation effect were
not changed by information of these issues, (4) when
attitudes toward capital punishment changed, the
change was primarily due to information regarding
racial disparities in justice and/or the execution of
innocent persons, and finally (5) changed death penalty opinions tended to rebound to their original, preinformed positions (Bohm, 1998, pp. 40–41; 2003a,
pp. 43–44).
J.K. Cochran, M.B. Chamlin / Journal of Criminal Justice 33 (2005) 573–584
With regard to the latter finding, Bohm (2003a,
p. 44) suggested that bdeath penalty opinions may not
be significantly influenced by increased knowledge
about the death penalty or may be influenced only
temporarily, at least if that knowledge is obtained in a
college classroom.Q The purpose of the present study
was to add to this body of literature by examining
whether or not similar findings were produced under
enhanced/improved treatment conditions (discussed
below), especially during a time of increased public
scrutiny to the issue of capital punishment.
The most recent of Bohm’s studies on the issue
(Bohm & Vogel, 1994) was based on data collected
no more recently than the spring of 1989 or the fall of
1994 (Wright et al., 1995). Only two published studies
used data collected more recently to assess the Marshall
hypotheses (Clarke et al., 2001; Lambert & Clarke,
2001). Yet numerous significant events related to the
death penalty took place since the mid-1990s, and these
events, especially if coupled with thorough exposure to
information about the death penalty, could very well
have established a unique context for testing the Marshall hypotheses. Bohm (2003a, pp. 186–192) outlined
a number of these potentially influential events. These
included (a) the 1997 American Bar Association resolution calling for a moratorium on capital punishment,
(b) the 1997 requirement that Russia abolish the death
penalty as a criterion for membership in the Council of
Europe, (c) the joint campaign in 1999 of the Catholic
Church and both Reformed and Conservative Jewish
groups calling for the abolition of capital punishment,
(d) legislative calls for a moratorium on capital punishment in 1999 in Connecticut, Illinois, Maryland, Montana, Nebraska, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and
Washington, (e) actual moratoriums on executions imposed by Governor George Ryan of Illinois in 2000 and
Governor Parris Glendening of Maryland in 2003, (f)
the abolition of the death penalty in New Hampshire in
2000, (g) the publications of the Liebman study establishing that two-thirds of all capital cases nationwide
between 1973 and 1995 were contaminated by serious,
reversible errors (Liebman, Fagan, & West, 2000) and
the study by Scheck, Nuefeld, and Dwyer (2001) of the
Innocence Project documenting numerous exoneration
of wrongfully convicted criminals, (h) the U.S. Supreme Court rulings in Atkins v. Virginia (2002) and
Ring v. Arizona (2002), (i) public criticisms of the
quality of lawyering in capital cases uttered by Justices
O’Connor and Ginsberg, (j) the release in 2000 of a
Justice Department report regarding racial disparities in
capital sentencing, (k) the re-introduction to Congress
of the Innocence Protection Act in 2001, (l) formation
575
of the politically conservative National Commission to
Prevent Wrongful Executions, (m) the 2003 executive
pardons and commutations granted by Illinois Governor Ryan to all persons sentenced to death, and (n) the
United Nations’ Commission on Human Rights condemnation of the United States for failing to abolish
capital punishment. Given these events, it was no surprise the numerous public opinion polls taken over the
past several years indicated the lowest recorded level of
death penalty support since the mid-1960s and the
greatest drop in support ever recorded (Bohm, 2003a,
pp. 191–192).
Methodology
The research design employed was a one-group
pretest-post-test design modeled largely after the
works of Bohm and his colleagues (Bohm, 1989,
1990; Bohm et al, 1990, 1991; Bohm & Vogel, 1991,
1994, 2002; Bohm et al., 1993). The subjects for this
study were seventy undergraduate students of a large,
urban university in west-central Florida enrolled in a
special topics course on the death penalty within the
criminology major during the summer of 2003. All
students enrolled in this course were criminology
majors (sixty-nine) or minors (one). Fifty-six percent
of the subjects were female, 60 percent were White, 23
percent Black, 16 percent Hispanic, and 1 percent
bother.Q The mean age of these subjects was 23.1
(SD = 5.75; range = 19–65). Fifty-seven percent were
seniors and 43 percent juniors (all special topics courses
in the criminology major were restricted to upper-division students). The self-reported grade point average of
the students was 2.94 (SD = 0.43; range 2.00–3.81–a
minimum 2.00 g.p.a. was required for both the major
and minor in criminology) and 58 percent indicated
having previous exposure to information on capital
punishment presented in previous courses. The profile
of these students was nearly identical to that of the
major as a whole.
Similar to Bohm’s designs, the course met for 3.5
hours a day, twice a week, for six weeks (forty-two
classroom hours, less brief breaks on most days). The
assigned text for the course was Bohm’s Deathquest II
(2003b). In Bohm’s studies, the text used was Bedau’s
(1982) The Death Penalty in America, third edition.
The authors felt the Bohm text was superior for the
purposes of the current study because it was much more
current, and both more thorough and more accessible to
an undergraduate readership. In addition to the text,
other sources of death penalty information included
daily lectures and discussions, a required packet of
576
J.K. Cochran, M.B. Chamlin / Journal of Criminal Justice 33 (2005) 573–584
readings containing twenty-two reprints of original empirical studies relating to death penalty issues, and four
redacted U.S. Supreme Court rulings (Furman v. Georgia, 1972; Gregg v. Georgia, 1976; McCleskey v.
Kemp, 1987; Witherspoon v. Illinois, 1968), and several
invited presentations and guest speakers. As with
Bohm’s course description, topics covered in the course
included the history of the death penalty in the U.S.,
with special emphasis on its legal history as developed
through relevant case law in the decisions of the U.S.
Supreme Court. Also covered in the course were the
issues of public opinion, theological and philosophical
approaches to the issue of capital punishment, retribution, the marginal deterrent and incapacitation effects of
the death penalty, the issues of innocence and miscarriages of justice in the administration of the death
penalty, questions of arbitrariness and caprice, as well
as questions of racial/ethnic-, economic-, gender-, and
age-based disparities in capital sentencing, and the
relative economic cost of capital punishment.
As was the case in the Bohm studies, the instructor
(lead author) was forthright in presenting personal
views of the death penalty, but strongly emphasized
the importance for the students to form their own,
informed opinions. To the best of the instructor’s abilities, all sides of an argument were presented on issues
without a preference for any position; in fact, the
instructor would often take the role of bdevil’s
advocateQ to provoke thought and discussion. Finally,
it was clearly announced to the students, and enforced
throughout the course, that students’ grades and other
evaluations were independent of their personal views.
The course, text, instructor, and other course materials
were all quite favorably evaluated by the students and
several of the students offered written comments regarding the quality of the course and the great amount
of information they felt they learned (91.4 percent
indicated that they strongly agreed with the statement:
bOverall, I learned a great deal from this course,Q the
remaining 8.6 percent agreed with this statement). Several indicated that the course caused them to change
their views regarding capital punishment (58.6 percent
less supportive/more strongly opposed; 5.7 percent less
opposed/more strongly in favor), while others indicated
that their opinions had not changed (35.7 percent), but
nearly all of the written comments indicated that the
students felt the course was provocative and gave them
pause. The authors interpreted these comments as external validation that the bexperimental stimulusQ was
sufficient in both quantity and quality of exposure (c.f.
Lord et al., 1979; Sarat & Vidmar, 1976; Vidmar &
Dittenhoffer, 1981).
On the first day of classes, after a brief introduction
of the course, the students were asked to complete a
brief questionnaire regarding their views on capital
punishment and to take a bknowledgeQ pretest. The
pretest was comprised of fifty randomly selected multiple-choice and true/false items derived from the bank
of test items developed for the Bohm text. The pretest
was graded, but did not count in the calculation of the
students’ final course grades. These same fifty items
comprised the bknowledgeQ post-test given as the final
exam for the course; scores on this exam did count as
25 percent of the students’ final course grades. Scores
for the percentage of items answered correctly across
these two examinations constituted measures of student knowledge. Change in knowledge (knowledge
gains) was measured as the difference between posttest and pretest scores. Also administered on the last
day of classes, immediately following the administration of the final bpost-testQ examination was a followup questionnaire identical to that administered at the
pretest less some items. Change in self-assessed
knowledge was also measured as the difference in
these assessments from the start of the course to the
end.
In some of the Bohm studies bknowledgeQ was
operationalized simply as exposure to the death penalty course/materials (Bohm, 1989, 1990; Bohm et al.,
1990, 1991; Bohm & Vogel, 1991; Wright et al.,
1995), in others a fourteen-item scale was employed
(Bohm et al., 1991) or a single self-defined student
assessment of knowledge item was utilized (Bohm &
Vogel, 1994; Bohm et al., 1993). In most of Bohm’s
studies, attitudes toward the death penalty were compared before and after exposure and/or between
bexperimentalQ and bcontrolQ groups (Bohm, 1989,
1990; Bohm et al., 1990, 1991; Bohm & Vogel,
1991; Wright et al., 1995). In others, bknowledgeQ
levels were correlated with death penalty opinions
both at the start of the course and at the end
(Bohm & Vogel, 1994; Bohm et al., 1993), or
changes in knowledge was examined but not correlated with death penalty support or change in death
penalty support (Bohm et al., 1991). In fact, none of
these studies examined the effects of measured
change in knowledge levels with changes, if any, in
death penalty attitudes and beliefs as was necessary
for a more complete test of the second of the three
Marshall hypotheses. The present study addressed this
shortcoming.
Students’ before and after attitudes toward capital
punishment were assessed through two items. The
first asked bWhich of the following statements best
J.K. Cochran, M.B. Chamlin / Journal of Criminal Justice 33 (2005) 573–584
describes your position toward the death penalty for
all persons convicted of first-degree murder?Q Response categories ranged from 1 = very strongly opposed to 7 = very strongly in favor. The second items
asked, bWould you support an alternative to the death
penalty where a convicted first-degree murderer is
sentenced to life in prison, without any possibility
of parole?Q to which the subjects could respond
1 = yes, 0 = no, or 0.5 = don’t know. While Bohm’s
studies employed four measures of death penalty
support, these two items permitted the authors to
assess both the students’ general/overall support for
capital punishment as well and their preference for it
relative to the life without possibility of parole
(LWOP) alternative.
The questionnaires also included a series of eleven
statements representing btruthsQ and bmythsQ about
capital punishment to which the students were
asked to indicate the degree they agreed/disagreed
(1 = strongly disagree; 4 = strongly agree). Four of
these statements represented death penalty btruthsQ:
(1) There is strong reason to believe that similar
offenders convicted of murder often receive dissimilar sentences; that is, some are sentenced to death
while others are sentenced to an alternative less than
death,Q (2) bPoor people who commit murder are
more likely to be sentenced to death than rich people,Q (3) bA Black person is more likely to receive
the death penalty than a White person for the same
crime,Q and (4) bThose who murder White victims
are more likely to receive the death penalty than
those who murder Blacks.Q These four items were
combined into an additive death penalty btruthsQ
scale.
The remaining seven items represented death penalty bmythsQ: (1) bThe murder rate usually drops in
the weeks following a well-publicized execution,Q (2)
bThe murder rate is lower in states with the death
penalty,Q (3) bThe best available research findings
consistently reveal unambiguous evidence that capital
punishment reduces homicide,Q (4) bThe death penalty
is more effective than life imprisonment without possibility of parole in protecting society from the future
actions of those who have already committed capital
crimes,Q (5) bOnly legally relevant criteria distinguish
murderers sentenced to death from those sentenced to
a punishment less than death,Q (6) bThere is no
evidence to support the claim that innocent persons
have ever been sentenced to death and executed in
error,Q and (7) bCapital punishment is less expensive
than alternative punishments such as life imprisonment without opportunity for parole.Q These seven
577
items were combined into an additive death penalty
bmythsQ scale.
In addition to both start of the course and end of the
course measures of these death penalty items, the study
also included measures of change in these attitudes and
beliefs. These change measures were operationalized as
pretest-post-test differences. Each was constructed in
such a way that positive associations between these
change scores and the change in knowledge measures
(objectively and subjectively assessed knowledge
gains) would indicate support for the second Marshall
hypothesis. That is, because gains in knowledge about
the death penalty should result in diminished death
penalty support and bmythQ adherence, these two
change measures differenced the post-test measure
from the pretest measures. Conversely, because a preference for the LWOP alternative and adherence to death
penalty btruthsQ should increase after exposure to information, these two change scores differenced the pretest
measure form the post-test.
Retribution was measured on the pretest/before
questionnaire by asking the students to indicate the
degree to which they agree/disagree (1 = strongly
agree, 4 = strongly disagree) to the following two statements: bThose who take a life should forfeit their own
in return,Q and bSociety has a right to get revenge when
a serious crime like murder has been committed.Q Despite a substantial literature on the concept of retribution which made a clear distinction between retribution
as bjust desertQ versus retribution as bvengeanceQ
(Finckenauer, 1988), the authors elected to combine
these two items into a single, additive scale. The
authors did so because, despite this conceptual distinction, there was little evidence of an empirical distinction
among the students sampled. That is, these two items
were fairly strongly correlated (r = .823, p b .0001) and
formed a single factor solution (eigenvalue = 1.725)
upon which each item loaded at .92; the additive
scale produced from these two items had an alpha
reliability of .87.
Lastly, students were asked to self-assess their level
of knowledge about the death penalty. They were
asked, bHow informed do you feel you are regarding
the death penalty? Response options ranged from
1 = very poorly informed to 6 = very well informed.
All of these items, other than the retribution items, were
included on both the pretest/before and the post-test/
after questionnaires. Students also supplied demographic information on the pretest questionnaire and their
student identification numbers on all five exams and
both questionnaires, thus permitting ease in merging
these multiple sources of data.
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J.K. Cochran, M.B. Chamlin / Journal of Criminal Justice 33 (2005) 573–584
Table 2
Mean levels of knowledge, death penalty support and beliefs about
capital punishment before and after exposure to information (n = 70)
Results
The first Marshall hypothesis
Before
The first of the three Marshall hypotheses claims
that informed opinion opposes capital punishment, or
phrased differently, that capital punishment support is
inversely associated with knowledge about it. Table
1, which reports bivariate associations (at the beginning of the course and at its conclusion) between
death penalty knowledge (objective and subjectively
assessed) and death penalty attitudes and beliefs
(btruthsQ and bmythsQ), offers a simple test of this
hypothesis. Objectively assessed levels of death penalty knowledge (pretest scores) were not significantly
associated with death penalty support, as the hypothesis claims, nor with a preference for capital punishment over the LWOP alternative. Initial levels of
death penalty information, however, were associated
with acceptance of death penalty btruthsQ (r = .263)
and the rejection of death penalty bmythsQ (r =
!.267). At the conclusion of the course, however,
the objectively assessed level of student knowledge
about the death penalty (post-test scores) was inversely associated with death penalty support (r = !.227)
as well as the adoption of death penalty bmythsQ
(r = !.262). These correlations, which were supportive of the first Marshall hypothesis, were observed
after exposure to information; thus, the authors believed they were more compelling. Nevertheless, this
initial findings offered, at best, mixed support for the
claim that support for capital punishment was inversely related to knowledge about it.
Students’ self-assessed level of knowledge about
capital punishment failed to be significantly associated
with any of the measures of death penalty opinion at the
end of the course; however, several pretest associations
were statistically significant and merit discussion. At
Table 1
Bivariate correlations between knowledge levels and death penalty
attitudes and beliefs (n = 70)
Death penalty Support Preference bTruthsQ bMythsQ Retribution
knowledge:
Before exposure
Objective
!.017 !.039
Subjective
.485* !.249*
.263*
.101
!.267* .031
.080 .402*
After exposure
Objective
!.227*
.064
Subjective
.084 !.083
.158
.023
!.262*
.039
* p b .05.
Support for capital punishment
LWOP alternative
Death penalty btruthsQ
Scale
Item 1
Item 2
Item 3
Item 4
Death penalty bmythsQ
Scale
Item 1
Item 2
Item 3
Item 4
Item 5
Item 6
Item 7
Death penalty information
Objective
Subjective
After
Difference
4.86
0.70
3.99
0.82
!0.87*
0.12*
16.04
4.01
4.27
3.94
3.81
18.40
4.40
4.73
4.63
4.64
2.36*
0.39*
0.46*
0.69*
0.83*
17.71
2.54
2.07
2.44
3.01
3.49
1.49
2.67
14.04
2.66
1.40
1.93
2.47
2.89
1.19
1.51
!3.67*
0.12 n.s.
!0.67*
!0.51*
!0.54*
!0.60*
!0.30*
!1.16*
36.99
3.84
82.36
5.21
45.37*
1.37*
* p b .05.
the beginning of the course, students who supported
capital punishment (r = .485), who preferred it over the
LWOP alternative (r = !.249), and/or who supported
retribution (r = .402) tended to self-assess their level of
death penalty knowledge higher than those who opposed capital punishment, preferred the LWOP alternative, and/or rejected retribution. Perhaps death penalty
supporters were more inclined to believe they were well
informed about capital punishment, a belief which was
belied by their low scores on the objective pretest
presented below.
The second Marshall hypothesis
The second of the three Marshall hypotheses claims
that increases in knowledge about capital punishment
(i.e., knowledge gains) should be associated with diminished support and increased opposition for the death
penalty. As an initial test of this hypothesis, Table 2
presents before-after comparisons of means with regard
to student death penalty support, adherence to death
penalty beliefs (both btruthsQ and bmythsQ) and death
penalty knowledge (both objectively and subjectively
assessed). Most salient for the purposes of this study
were the difference values reported in the last column
of the table. These values indicated a significant decrease in general death penalty support (mean
diff. = !0.87) and a significant increase in preference
for the LWOP alternative (mean diff = 0.12) after the
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J.K. Cochran, M.B. Chamlin / Journal of Criminal Justice 33 (2005) 573–584
Consistent with the second Marshall hypothesis, half
(thirty-six of seventy) students in the course bsoftenedQ
their stance on capital punishment. Twenty-one, who
originally supported capital punishment, diminished
their level of support; twelve of these twenty-one students switched from supporting capital punishment to
opposing it. In addition, seven students enhanced their
opposition while another eight shifted from uncertainty
to opposition (six of the eight to a position of strongly
or very strongly opposing). Similarly, eighteen students
shifted their penalty preference away from capital punishment; of these, sixteen developed a preference for
the LWOP alternative.
Conversely, nine students bhardenedQ their views
on capital punishment by the conclusion of the course.
Four strengthened their original positions of support,
all either strongly or very strongly in favor of capital
punishment. Five more weakened their opposition,
four of who shifted from an opening position of
opposition to a closing position of support. Similarly,
six students shifted their penalty preference away from
the LWOP alternative, five of who developed a preference for the death penalty. Perhaps this bhardeningQ
of views was due to bbiased assimilation and attitude
polarizationQ (Lord et al., 1979), or perhaps it was
reflective of the instructor’s efforts to present all sides
of the issues in a balanced manner. A comparison of
the profiles of those who bsoftenedQ their stance with
those who bhardenedQ their stance revealed only one
significant difference: bsoftenersQ as a group had a
higher grade point average at the beginning of the
course than bhardenersQ (g.p.a. = 3.05 versus 2.65).
conclusion of the course. Likewise, all four of the death
penalty btruthQ items, as well as the additive scale
comprised of these items showed significant increases
in adherence by the conclusion of the course. Similarly,
exposure to the information presented in the course was
likely responsible for the significant reductions in death
penalty bmythQ adherence. The authors express confidence that exposure to information about the death
penalty was the likely source of these changes by
noting the dramatic gains in knowledge evident in the
average difference between student scores on the pretest
and post-test examinations (mean difference = 45.37);
significant gains in students’ self-assessed level of
death penalty knowledge (mean difference = 1.37)
also support this belief.
Table 3 provides additional evidence of attitude
change, which was likely to be the result of exposure
to information. This table presents before-after crosstabulations for both death penalty support and death
penalty preference. The main diagonal in these crosstabulations shows the number of students who did not
change their attitudes at the end of the course. The
upper triangles report the number of students whose
views on capital punishment bhardenedQ (i.e., became
more supportive of capital punishment, less oppositional, or shifted from a position of uncertainty/neutrality or
opposition to a position of support); the lower triangle
report the number of students whose views on capital
punishment bsoftenedQ (i.e., became more opposed to
capital punishment, less supportive, or shifted from a
position of uncertainty/neutrality or support to a position of opposition).
Table 3
Stability and change in death penalty opinions before and after exposure to information (n = 70)
Death penalty support after exposure:
Very strongly oppose
Death penalty support
Very strongly oppose
Strongly oppose
Oppose
Don’t know
Support
Strongly support
Very strongly support
before exposure:
0
2
2
2
1
1
0
Strongly oppose
1
2
3
4
1
2
0
Oppose
0
0
2
2
7
0
0
Death penalty preference after exposure:
Yes
Death penalty preference before exposure:
Yes
5
Don’t know
3
No
2
Don’t know
No
2
2
1
7
9
39
Don’t know
Support
Strongly support
Very strongly support
0
0
0
1
0
1
1
0
0
1
3
9
5
1
0
0
0
0
1
5
1
0
0
0
0
1
2
6
580
J.K. Cochran, M.B. Chamlin / Journal of Criminal Justice 33 (2005) 573–584
Perhaps brighter students assimilate information differently than do lesser students.
So far the findings were, for the most part, supportive
of the second of the three Marshall hypotheses; that is,
increases in death penalty information were associated
with decreases in death penalty support. These findings,
however, were indirect and were, at best, only suggestive. More compelling evidence was required.
Table 4 presents the bivariate associations between
changes (gains) in student knowledge on capital punishment with changes, if any, on their death penalty
attitudes and beliefs, another test of the second Marshall
hypothesis. Most of these correlations were positive
and, thus, indicated that larger gains in knowledge
were associated with changes in death penalty attitudes
and beliefs in the direction predicted by the second
Marshall hypothesis. That is, increased knowledge
was associated with decreased support/increased opposition for the death penalty in general, greater preference for the LWOP alternative, greater adherence to
death penalty btruths,Q and weaker adherence to death
penalty bmyths.Q Only one of these associations, however, attained statistical significance; as objectively
measured gains in knowledge increased, btruthQ adherence increased (r = .20).
The third Marshall hypothesis
The associations reported in Table 4 between
knowledge gains (both objectively and subjectively
assessed) and changes in death penalty attitudes and
beliefs were also examined for the retributivists (those
who scored above the mean of the retribution scale;
n = 37) and the non-retributivists (those who scored at
or below the mean; n = 33) to test the third Marshall
hypothesis. The third Marshall hypothesis argues that
retributivists’ support for capital punishment is immune to change due to the presentation of information
regarding the death penalty. The associations reported
in Table 4 were contrary to this claim. The effects of
knowledge gains (both objectively assessed and sub-
Table 5
Partial correlations between change in knowledge levels and
change in death penalty attitudes and beliefs controlling for retribution (n = 70)
Change in death penalty
Support
Preference
Change in level of knowledge:
Objective
.109
.086
Subjective
.031
.031
bTruthsQ
bMythsQ
.200*
.158
.102
.071
* p b .05.
jectively assessed) on change in death penalty support
among non-retributivists were negative (r = !.02,
r = !.01, respectively). Not only did gains in knowledge fail to significantly influence the death penalty
attitudes and beliefs of those who eschewed retribution (NR), but these gains in knowledge, when objectively assessed, did significantly decrease support for
capital punishment among those who espoused retribution (r = .30), a finding contrary to the third Marshall hypothesis.
Table 5 presents the partial correlations between the
two gains in knowledge measures and the four measures of change in death penalty attitudes/beliefs while
controlling for the retribution scale. Here objectively
assessed gains in knowledge were significantly associated with increased adherence to death penalty btruthsQ
(r = .200). Except for this one statistically significant
positive correlation, these findings did not offer much
support for the Marshall hypotheses. That is, while the
direction of most of these correlation coefficients was
consistent with that predicted by the second Marshall
hypothesis, suggesting that increased knowledge about
the death penalty was associated with decreased support for it, decreased preference for it, increased btruthQ
adherence, and decreased bmythQ adherence, the majority of these coefficients failed to attain statistical
significance.
As for the third of the three Marshall hypotheses
specifically, which claims that the effects of knowledge
gains on change in death penalty attitudes and beliefs
Table 4
Bivariate correlations between change in knowledge levels and change in death penalty attitudes and beliefs (total sample (T) n = 70; retributivists
(R) n = 37; non-retributivists (NR) n = 33)
Change in level of knowledge:
Change in death penalty:
Support
Objective
Subjective
* p b .05.
bTruthsQ
Preference
bMythsQ
T
R
NR
T
R
NR
T
R
NR
T
R
NR
.11
.02
.30*
.06
!.02
!.01
.09
.03
.05
!.11
.13
.21
.20*
.15
.26
.09
.17
.24
.09
.02
.05
.06
.17
.05
581
J.K. Cochran, M.B. Chamlin / Journal of Criminal Justice 33 (2005) 573–584
are restricted to those who eschew retribution, these
findings reported in Tables 4 and 5 failed to provide
support. Once again, most of the coefficients failed to
attain statistical significance. Second, while most were
in the expected direction, those for the effects of knowledge gain on change in death penalty support for the
non-retributivists were not. Third, contrary to the third
Marshall hypothesis, objectively assessed gains in student knowledge were positively and significantly associated with change in death penalty support, indicating
that informed retributivists significantly reduced their
level of support for capital punishment by the end of the
course. Conversely, controlling for the retribution scale,
the bivariate association between knowledge gains objectively assessed and change in death penalty btruthQ
adherence was significant and positive, implying that
gains in student knowledge were associated with increased truth adherence. The study then turned to an
examination as to whether or not similar effects were
found under multivariate analyses.
Table 6 presents the results of Ordinary Least
Squares (OLS) regression models testing the effects
of objective and subjective knowledge gains on
changes in death penalty attitudes and beliefs while
controlling for the effects of several other student characteristics. For each of the four death penalty attitude/
belief variables, models were reported for the total
student enrollment (n = 70), as well as for the retributivists and the non-retributivists. Several effects reported in Table 6 were worth noting. First, several of
these models tended to account for a substantial amount
of the variation in the dependent variables (R2 N 20),
while others did not. Second, self-assessed gains in
death penalty knowledge were not significantly associated with changes in death penalty attitudes or beliefs.
Gains in knowledge objectively assessed were associated with increased adherence to death penalty btruthsQ
for the student subjects overall (b = .064) and among
the retributivists (b = .128). Third, among the student
subjects as a whole, start of course retribution scores
were not significantly associated with any change in
death penalty attitudes or beliefs. Fourth, the more
courses covering the death penalty that students
reported they had taken at the start of the course, the
greater the change toward support for the LWOP alternative by the end of the course, a finding observed for
the subjects as a whole (b = .128), as well as among the
retributivists (b = .158). Finally, stronger grade point
averages were associated with decreased support for
the death penalty among retributivists (b = 1.008) and
increased preference for the LWOP alternative across
all three models (b = .323, b = .332, and b = .346).
Conversely, among retributivists, stronger grade point
averages were associated with decreased adherence to
death penalty btruthsQ (b = !3.794).
The models presented in Table 6 were specifically
designed to test the second and third of the three
Marshall hypotheses, that knowledge gains should
result in decreased death penalty support (hypothesis
2), but that this effect should be restricted to those
who do not espouse retribution (hypothesis 3). With
regard to these two hypotheses, the results were ambiguous. First, while most of the effects for the two
gains in knowledge measures were in the expected
Table 6
OLS regression coefficients (b) for the effects of knowledge gain on attitudinal change (total sample (T), retributivists (R), and non-retributivists
(N-R))
Change in:
Death penalty support
Death penalty preference
Death penalty btruthsQ
T
T
T
R
Variables:
Change in objective
.007
.014
knowledge
Change in subjective !.022
.065
knowledge
Age
.006
.001
Black
!.478
.038
Hispanic
!.209
.171
Sex (female = 1)
.520
.572
Grade point average
.858
1.008*
Courses taken
!.037
.040
Retribution
.012 –
Intercept
!2.279 !3.190
R2
.122
.204
N
70
37
* p b .05.
N-R
.001 !.001
!.316
.020
!.011 !.030*
!1.278
.003
!1.023
.111
.335
.245*
.691
.323*
.901
.128*
–
.021
!.067 !.558
.164
.370
33
70
R
N-R
!.006
!.001
!.034
.021
!.021
.040
.439*
.133
.332*
.158*
–
!.353
.364
37
!.032*
!.041
!.200
.226
.346*
.081
–
!.318
.533
33
R
Death penalty bmythsQ
N-R
T
R
N-R
.064*
.128*
.040
.027 !.007
.291
.339
.008
.446
!.047
! 3.351*
!.448
1.133
! 1.081
!.591
.069
3.546
.247
70
.147
!4.320*
.055
!1.239
!3.794*
!.777
–
6.742
.367
37
.036
.589
!.104
!.098 !.071 !.332
!2.823 !.468
.437
!0.375 !.418
.962
2.880
.133
.939
1.220
.537 1.439
!.702
.790 1.188
–
.362 –
!.988 !1.858 5.389
.322
.054
.064
33
70
37
!.038
!1.338
!3.620
!1.404
.421
.473
–
2.465
.106
339
582
J.K. Cochran, M.B. Chamlin / Journal of Criminal Justice 33 (2005) 573–584
positive direction, some were not. In addition, only
two of the twelve gain in knowledge effects attained
statistical significance; both involving the influence of
increased knowledge objectively assessed on death
penalty btruthQ adherence. One of these effects, however, was observed for the retributivists, a finding
inconsistent with the third Marshall hypothesis.
On the other hand, several other effects reported in
Table 6 were intriguing. Students who entered the
course with strong grade point averages were more
inclined to change their death penalty attitudes and
beliefs in a manner consistent with the Marshall hypotheses. Stronger grade point averages were associated
with a decreased preference for the death penalty in all
three models examined, and with decreased death penalty support among the retributivists. Strong grade point
average, however, was also associated with decreased
adherence to death penalty btruthsQ among the retributivists. Lastly, as the number of previous classes taken
in which the death penalty was covered increased,
student preference for the death penalty decreased, a
finding observed for the students as a whole and among
those who espoused retribution.
Discussion
In the Furman decision (Furman v. Georgia, 1972)
Supreme Court Justice Marshall emphasized the importance of public opinion as an indicator of the bevolving
standards of decency that mark the progress of a maturing society;Q these standards of decency were necessary to assess the constitutionality of the death penalty
and other criminal sanctions under the Eighth Amendment. He also stressed, however, that the probative
value of public sentiment regarding capital punishment
was limited only to informed opinion. That is, Marshall
believed that public support for capital punishment was
largely a function of a lack of knowledge about it. But,
he added, if fully informed about capital punishment,
the majority would conclude that the death penalty was
both immoral and unconstitutional. Marshall acknowledged one exception to this assumption; for those who
support capital punishment under a retributive rationale,
information about capital punishment would not be
persuasive.
Justice Marshall’s assertions regarding the effects of
information on public support for the death penalty
have been converted into a series of research questions
by social scientists that are referred to as the bMarshall
hypotheses.Q These hypotheses are as follows: (1) support for capital punishment is inversely associated with
knowledge about it, (2) exposure to information about
capital punishment produces sentiments in opposition
to capital punishment, but (3) exposure to information
about capital punishment will have no impact on those
who support it for retributive reasons.
In turn, there were at least eighteen published studies
that had tested one or more of these hypotheses (Bohm,
1989, 1990; Bohm et al., 1990, 1991; Bohm & Vogel,
1991, 1994, 2002; Bohm et al., 1993; Clarke et al.,
2001; Ellsworth & Ross, 1983; Lambert & Clarke,
2001; Longmire, 1996; Lord et al., 1979; Patenaude,
2001; Sandys, 1995; Sarat & Vidmar, 1976; Vidmar &
Dittenhoffer, 1981; Wright et al., 1995). These studies
employed a common methodology: (1) a pretest measure of attitudes toward capital punishment, (2) exposure to information about capital punishment, (3) a
post-test measure of death penalty attitudes, and (4) a
comparison of pretest attitudes with the post-test attitudes to assess the extent to which exposure to information about capital punishment led to any bsofteningQ
of attitudes toward the death penalty. Moreover, these
studies tended to find somewhat mixed though relatively consistent support for the three Marshall hypotheses.
That is, informed opinion was less supportive of capital
punishment; exposure to information tended to reduce
support for capital punishment; and retributivists tended
to be immune to the effects of information about capital
punishment.
The intent of this study was to add to this body of
literature by examining whether or not similar findings
were produced under enhanced methodological conditions and conducted during a time of increased public
scrutiny to the issue of capital punishment. Almost all
of the previous research on this question was conducted
with data collected prior to the current public scrutiny
given the death penalty. In addition, few of the previous
studies measured the amount of knowledge gains produced by exposure to information about the death
penalty and none assessed the relationship, if any,
between knowledge gains and changes in death penalty
attitudes and beliefs.
This study explicitly measured knowledge gain and
its association with attitudinal change; thus, it marked an
important contribution to this area of inquiry. In brief,
the study found a very mixed body of results, some of
which were supportive of the Marshall hypotheses,
some of which were not, and some of which were
even contrary to them. With regard to the first Marshall
hypothesis, this study found some evidence that death
penalty attitudes and beliefs were inversely associated
with student’s level of knowledge. At the start of the
course, level of death penalty knowledge was associated
with higher levels of adherence to death penalty btruthsQ
J.K. Cochran, M.B. Chamlin / Journal of Criminal Justice 33 (2005) 573–584
and lower levels of adherence to death penalty bmyths.Q
At the end of the course, after exposure to information,
higher levels of knowledge were associated with lower
levels of death penalty support and lower levels of
adherence to death penalty bmyths.Q
The second Marshall hypothesis argues that gains in
knowledge about the death penalty should be associated
with reductions in death penalty support. On this question, the findings were mixed. First, across all indicators
examined, mean levels of knowledge and death penalty
attitudes were significantly different and in the expected
direction at the end of the course after exposure to
information when compared to comparative mean levels
at the start of the course. Students showed significant
gains in knowledge, adherence to death penalty btruths,Q
and preferences for the LWOP alternative to the death
penalty. Second, these students also reported decreased
levels of death penalty support and decreased adherence
to death penalty bmyths.Q In addition, half (thirty-six of
seventy) of the students bsoftenedQ their positions of the
death penalty either by no longer supporting it, supporting it less, or opposing it more. Conversely, nine of the
seventy students bhardenedQ their positions. Third, all
the correlations between the measures of knowledge
gain and change in death penalty attitudes and beliefs
were in the direction expected from and consistent with
the second Marshall hypothesis. Only one of these
associations, however, attained statistical significance
(objectively assessed gains in knowledge were associated with a significant increase in student adherence to
death penalty btruthsQ).
The third and final Marshall hypothesis restricts the
effects of knowledge gains on change in death penalty
support for all but those who support for retributive
purposes. Here the findings were the least supportive.
First, none of the measures of association for the relationship between knowledge gains and change in death
penalty attitudes or beliefs attained statistical significance among the non-retributive students, in fact, some
of these associations were even in the opposite direction
anticipated by the Marshall hypotheses. Second, the
only association between knowledge gains and change
in attitude were observed for the more retributive students. That is, students who at the start of the course
reported that they espoused retribution showed significant increase in adherence to death penalty btruths.Q
Such a finding, however, was irrelevant to Marshall’s
claims.
In addition to these findings, this study also revealed
several other unanticipated results which the authors
felt merited additional attention. First, those students
most inclined to bsoftenQ their position on capital pun-
583
ishment had stronger self-reported grade point averages
at the start of the course. Higher grade point averages
were associated in a significant reduction in death
penalty support by the end of the course and with a
significant increase in student preference for the LWOP
alternative. Likewise, the more courses a student had
taken in which the death penalty was covered, the
greater the likelihood that students would shift their
preference toward the LWOP alternative after exposure
to an entire course devoted to the issue of capital
punishment. Oddly, these associations were observed
not only for the students as a whole, but also for those
who adhered to a retributive philosophy of punishment.
So, what does one make of this? Firstly, these findings were largely consistent with those reported by
others. Thus, the authors’ critique of the existing research for its failure to examine the associations between measures of knowledge gain and changes in
death penalty attitude was appropriate but failed to
make a difference in results. In addition, the authors’
belief that replicating this body of research during the
current period of public scrutiny might produce different findings was unfounded. More importantly, a superior research design replicated previous findings, did so
during a period of increased public scrutiny, and still
provided fairly strong, though somewhat mixed, support for the first two of the three Marshall hypotheses.
Furthermore, the study was able to refute Marshall’s
third hypothesis that those who espouse retribution are
immune to the effects of information; the findings
suggest that such persons may not be so closed-minded.
Several of Bohm’s more recent research efforts on
this issue had examined the extent to which the effects
of knowledge gains were enduring (Bohm & Vogel,
2002; Bohm et al., 1993). Bohm and his colleagues
found that while knowledge was retained, its influence
was not enduring. That is, observed changes death
penalty opinions due to exposure to information tended
to rebound to their original, pre-informed positions
(Bohm & Vogel, 2002; Bohm et al., 1993). Bohm
suggested that classroom environments might not be
the most effective conduits for long-term attitudinal
change as a function of information exchange.
While the authors could not as yet assess the longterm effects of knowledge gain, they did present some
findings which might suggest that Bohm’s critique of
course-based delivery of death penalty information was
premature. Perhaps, Bohm was correct with regard to
the effects of a single exposure or bdoseQ of information
provided by the classroom environment. This research,
however, suggested that multiple previous bdosesQ
might enhance the effectiveness of a subsequent but
584
J.K. Cochran, M.B. Chamlin / Journal of Criminal Justice 33 (2005) 573–584
thorough dosage of information. That is, the influence
of knowledge exposure on death penalty attitude
change among college students was greatest for those
students who had previous multiple exposures to similar information in other courses.
In addition, this research indicated that the influence
of information exposure on attitude change was strongest among those with higher grade point averages,
suggesting, perhaps, that stronger students are better
able/more inclined to employ such data in their own
decision-making and attitude formation. Certainly additional research on these conjectures is required.
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Cases cited
Atkins v. Virginia, 536 U. S. 304 (2002).
Furman v. Georgia, 408 U. S. 238 (1972).
Gregg v. Georgia, 428 U. S. 153 (1976).
McCleskey v. Kemp, 481 U. S. 279 (1987).
Ring v. Arizona, 536 U. S. 584 (2002).
Witherspoon v. Illinois, 391 U. S. 510 (1968).
Statutes cited
Innocence Protection Act (2001).