Miranda rights comprehension and advice to juveniles

Juveniles have limited understanding of their Miranda rights. Reforms including simplified wording and the presence of an “interested adult” have been implemented to assist juveniles with legal decisions, but adults’ understanding of Miranda rights is also limited. The present study examined whether adults’ Miranda knowledge related to their estimates of juveniles’ Miranda understanding and their advice to juveniles being questioned by police. Online participants (n= 498) completed measures of Miranda knowledge and read one of eight hypothetical scenarios varying the juvenile’s age (13 or 16 years), Miranda rights version (standard or simplified), and crime (shoplifting or shooting). Across all conditions, most participants felt that juveniles would not fully understand their rights and advised juveniles to invoke them. The simplified Miranda warning did not improve expectations of juvenile understanding or improve adults’ explanations of these rights. Findings from this study have policy and practice implications for juvenile justice and police procedure.

Grantor dc:publisher

University of Tennessee at Chattanooga

Author dc:creator

• Eggenberger, Aishani

Contributors dc:contributor

• Warren, Amye
• Ferrier, David E.; Holcombe, Jenny; McGuffee, Karen
• College of Arts and Sciences

• Juvenile delinquents
• Police questioning--United States
• Right to counsel--United States
• Self-incrimination--United States

Licence

• http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

Language dc:language

English, eng

Repository record dc:identifier

https://scholar.utc.edu/theses/649

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:scholar.utc.edu:theses-1817