Shaping attitudes toward wrongfully convicted individuals: an examination of brief video interventions

ABSTRACT

In a series of three studies, we investigated whether exposure to a brief video would influence attitudes toward wrongfully convicted individuals among undergraduate students (Studies 1 and 2) and community members (Study 3). In Study 1 (N = 216), we hypothesized that participants who watched a video about wrongful conviction (eyewitness misidentification vs. false confession) would have more positive attitudes toward wrongfully convicted individuals compared to those exposed to an unrelated video. In Study 2 (N = 203), we hypothesized that attitudes after, compared to before, watching the wrongful conviction video would be more positive. In Study 3 (N = 431), we explored the effect of an expert discussing wrongful conviction on attitudes. In all studies, we asked participants to watch a brief Innocence Project video of an exoneree discussing their wrongful conviction or an unrelated video and answer a series of questions assessing their attitudes toward wrongfully convicted individuals. Compared to those exposed to the control video, participants exposed to a video about wrongful conviction had more positive attitudes toward wrongfully convicted individuals. Based on these findings, we have evidence that watching these Innocence Project videos may result in more positive attitudes toward exonerees which could improve their reintegration.

KEYWORDS:

• Wrongful convictions
• exonerees
• attitudes
• video intervention
• reintegration

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author, Lesley Zannella, upon reasonable request.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 This holds true for all three studies in this manuscript.