Death Penalty: Is It Good or Bad Essay Example

Hypothesis in Literature Review

Public opinion regarding the death penalty holds significant importance in the United States as legislators rely on it to shape legislation related to this issue.

Considering that the government is formed by and for the people, it is essential for elected officials to consider public opinions. The perspectives of the general population on the death penalty hold importance and should be considered. Surveys have specifically focused on the execution of mentally disabled individuals. Furthermore, public sentiment significantly impacted the Supreme Court's ruling that executing individuals under 18 years old is unconstitutional. This case highlights how public opinion affects laws related to capital punishment.

Opponents of the death penalty argue that many Americans who support it do so without full information and solely out of a desire for retribution, rather than considering it as a better alternative to life imprisonment. Religion plays a significant role in shaping individuals' perspectives on various issues by offering guidance based on religious teachings. Often, religion opposes capital punishment because it views life as sacred and believes only God has the authority to take it away (Bedau, 1998). Religious individuals tend to have more conservative views on the death penalty compared to those who do not follow a religious faith. As a result, support for the death penalty decreases when it comes from religious individuals.

Political parties in all societies have the duty of addressing a range of issues, including the death penalty. In the United States, support for capital punishment is influenced by various political affiliations. Cultural beliefs play a significant role in shaping people's perspectives on the death penalty across different societies (Steinberg, 2003).

The death

penalty is strongly influenced by cultural beliefs within a society, which in turn shape individuals' opinions. These cultural views can vary and lead to opposing stances on capital punishment within the same society. Therefore, people's perspectives on the death penalty are greatly impacted by their cultural beliefs. Additionally, education plays a role in determining people's support for capital punishment.

Lower education levels are linked to increased insecurity about neighborhoods, whereas higher education levels tend to decrease feelings of insecurity. Moreover, race influences support for capital punishment, as white individuals are more inclined to endorse the death penalty compared to black individuals. Additionally, there are gender disparities in support for the death penalty, with men expressing greater support than women.

Method Section

The employed method entails actively listening to varied perspectives from a diverse group of individuals.

The study included two groups: a control group and an experimental group. Both groups took part in a class about the death penalty and used a Likert-type pretest-posttest method. The findings revealed that there was a significant main effect for significant and incapacitation interaction effect for universal administrative and considerations. Independent variables, such as race and gender, did not show strong associations with retribution, religious reasons, or police support. The research demonstrated that regardless of their group, black individuals disagreed with statements about the death penalty compared to white individuals. Black participants of both genders agreed with the statement on general deterrence while white participants did not. In the experimental group, black participants were more likely than white participants (including those in the control group) to agree with statements suggesting that capital punishment is racial discrimination or innocent people are frequently wrongly executed

(Baldus et al., 1990).

The study's results reveal that, in the experimental group, white individuals were more inclined to agree with the notion that capital punishment is discriminatory and innocent people are often unjustly killed compared to black individuals in the control group. The findings indicate that factors such as religious reasons, incapacitation, retribution, general deterrence, and police support were not significantly influenced by the experimental stimuli of the capital punishment class. These conclusions were anticipated because retribution is perceived as being driven by emotions rather than factual evidence (Banner, 2009). Religious justifications for supporting capital punishment are considered matters of faith rather than logical reasoning. The observed race effect concerning incapacitation suggests that belief in incapacitation as the primary justification for capital punishment has a stronger impact on black individuals relative to white individuals. These findings may reflect a broader issue of discrimination against black individuals within the criminal justice system.

Another method that was used is the telephone survey that indicated that having a single measure is not adequate to grasp the entire concept of capital punishment. From the study, fear is directly influenced by various exogenous variables. The older respondents are mostly likely to sense that their neighborhoods are unsafe than others.

References

1. AmericanPsychiatricAssociation. (1994).Diagnosticandstatisticalmanualofpsychiatric disorders (4th ed.). Washington, DC: Author
2. Baldus, D. C., Woodworth, G., ; Pulaski, C. A. (1990). Equal justice and the death penalty: A legal and empirical analysis.

Upne. Banner, S., ; Banner, S. (2009). The death penalty: An American history. Harvard University Press. Bedau, H.

A. (Ed.). (1998). The death penalty in America: Current controversies. Oxford University Press.

C., ; Gross, S. R. (1994). Hardening of the attitudes: Americans' views on the death penalty.

The

text contains a citation for an article titled "Less guilty by reason of adolescence: developmental immaturity, diminished responsibility, and the juvenile death penalty" from the Journal of Social Issues (50(2), 19-52), written by Steinberg, L., and Scott, E. S. Additionally, there is a citation for American Psychologist (58(12), 1009).