Emotional shocks can activate latent racial bias in sentencing

Evidence

Eren and Mocan (2018), however, showed that if the sentencing date in juvenile court cases in Louisiana happened to be during the week following a surprise loss of the Louisiana State University (LSU) football team, defendants received longer sentences—and this impact was driven by judges who received their undergraduate degrees from LSU. Importantly, the authors showed that, disregarding the impact of football games, there was no evidence of discrimination (in the sense of Equation (1)): the race of the defendant had no impact on judicial decisions after controlling for relevant case and defendant attributes. However, after a surprising LSU loss, racial bias emerged: the impact on sentence length following an upset loss was borne by Black defendants, suggesting an implicit bias against Blacks that emerged only when the judge had suffered an emotional shock. — Joseph Avery, Jim Sidanius, Joel Cooper, Gregory Davis, Amanda N., Bias in the Law, 754 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: An emotional shock can activate racial bias in judges who otherwise show none; Implicit bias alone insufficiently explains racial inequity in criminal justice outcomes — Joseph Avery, Jim Sidanius, Joel Cooper, Gregory Davis, Amanda N., Bias in the Law: A Definitive Look at…, 1356; Racial bias in criminal case outcomes varies by decision point and offense type — Joseph Avery, Jim Sidanius, Joel Cooper, Gregory Davis, Amanda N., Bias in the Law: A Definitive Look at…, 564 (+2 more)

Broader Connections

• An emotional shock can activate racial bias in judges who otherwise show none #expands (0.96)
• Bias against Black defendants emerges only after judges suffer emotional shocks #corroborates (0.95) — Joseph Avery, Jim Sidanius, Joel Cooper, Gregory Davis, Amanda N., Bias in the Law, 754