Metaphors to Use (or Avoid) in Voir Dire
by: Abassos • May 29, 2011 • no comments
Is crime a lurking wild beast or is it a spreading virus? The answer is that it's whatever you want it to be. Beasts and viruses are merely metaphors or frames. A frame is a container for a concept that will change everything about how the concept is perceived. As summarized by this recent psychology today article, if you describe crime as a wild beast, the vast majority of people will suggest law and order solutions like increased punishment or even calling in the military. If you describe crime as a virus, a solid majority will flip on its head and suggest social responses like improving the economy and education.
The strangest thing about framing is that people are so sure of their reasoning abilities they have no idea that the metaphor made them change their mind:
Interestingly, very few of the participants realized how affected they were by the differing crime metaphors. When Thibodeau and Boroditsky asked the participants to identify which parts of the text had most influenced their decisions, the vast majority pointed to the crime statistics, not the language. Only 3% identified the metaphors as culprits. The researchers confirmed their results with more experiments that used the same reports without the vivid words. Even though they described crime as a beast or virus only once, they found the same trend as before.
There will be a breakout talk at the annual conference on how to use framing to win cases.
