Brooke Bennett-Day

As part of a sabbatical project, I created a resource that includes trial transcript and summary materials from a number of published articles.

For this resource, my research assistants and I started with the full publication record (1977-present) of the journal Law and Human Behavior. We identified articles that involved jury members or a full jury making use of a trial summary or transcript. All of those articles (N = 110) were then coded for a number of variables, such as length and development of materials, type of crime, details on the defendant and victim, etc. Contact information was located for most authors, and we requested materials from 65 authors, with the understanding that newer studies would be more likely to produce materials. We received responses from about half of the authors, and materials from a number of the studies. My lab is currently working to extend the reach of the resource to include additional journals. If your research includes the use of written trial transcripts or summaries, consider sending materials for inclusion in the resource.