VIDEOTAPED VERSUS IN-COURT WITNESS TESTIMONY - DOES PROTECTING THE CHILD WITNESS JEOPARDIZE DUE-PROCESS

Videotaping depositions may protect a child witness from the stress of testifying in court but also may influence jurors' perceptions of the child and the defendant, and jurors' verdicts in systematic ways. The present study examines several psychological hypotheses that emerge f rom the controversy over the use of videotaped depositions of child wi tnesses in child sexual abuse trials. We predicted that student jurors viewing a videotaped deposition would be more proprosecution and less prodefense than those who did not receive testimony in such a form. T hus, it was predicted that jurors viewing a videotaped deposition woul d perceive the prosecution witnesses and their testimonies more favora bly, the defense witnesses and their testimonies less favorably, and g ive more guilty verdicts than jurors who viewed identical testimony du ring the course of a trial. We also predicted that females would be mo re proprosecution and less prodefense than males and that this gender difference would be accentuated by the medium of presentation. The med ium of presentation had only a few effects on jurors' responses. Howev er, when differences emerged, they generally provided support for the predicted main effects. The implications of these findings for the use of videotaped depositions of child sexual abuse victims are discussed .