The Psychology Behind 12 Angry Men Guilty or not guilty is the key question found stuck in the head of any juror on a murder case. It seems like such a simple question, but the twelve jurors for a murder case of a boy who may have killed his father takes the question to a whole new level. The behaviors of these twelve men are quite unique when looking at them psychologically. They can be determined by a numerous number of psychological phenomena. Some specific phenomena that can be shown using incidences throughout the movie of 12 Angry Men are conformity, stereotyping, memory, personality, and sensation and perception. Conformity was a very big deal in the movie. All men had to vote the same way, either guilty or non-guilty, for their discussion …show more content…
There were several incidences where memory played a key role in changing the minds of the jurors in the movie. One incidence was when they were talking about the boy not being able to remember the names of the movies he saw at the theater when he had went on the night of the murder. They had to rule it out because one of jurors couldn’t remember the name of one of the films he watched either just a few nights before. Some things are just never encoded into long-term memory making them impossible to …show more content…
Personality can be defined as the ways a person acts and thinks. The characteristics that make up how a person acts and thinks are called personality traits. Personality traits are the building blocks that make up a person’s personality, and the varied combination of traits is what make each person so unique. There are twelve very different personalities in the movie, one for each juror. There are many interesting personality traits that come out during the discussion of the trial. For example, one man in the movie described himself as excitable. This is a personality trait that means the person is rather tense, responding without hesitation to something stimulating. Personality traits that make up people’s personalities can sometimes make them judge something or someone easily without getting any of the facts first. Lastly, behavior can also be determined by sensation and perception, the stages of processing the information gathered from the senses. Sensation and perception depicts the world for humans. Without them, humans would not be able to truly experience what is going on around them. The first step, sensation, is the gathering of the information from the outside would through the five senses: sight, hearing, taste, touch, and smell. The information is then organized and interpreted by the brain through
This essay will compare and contrast the protagonist/antagonist's relationship with each other and the other jurors in the play and in the movie versions of Reginald Rose's 12 Angry Men. There aren't any changes made to the key part of the story, but yet the minor changes made in making the movie adaptation produce a different picture than what one imagines when reading the drama in the form of a play. First off, the settings in the movie are a great deal more fleshed out. In the play, the scene begins with the jurors regarding the judge's final statements concerning the case in the courtroom and then walking out into the jury room. In the movie, the audience is placed in the role of the invisible casual observer, who for perhaps the first 5 minutes of the movie, walks throughout the court building passing other court rooms, lawyers, defendants, security officers, elevators, etc.
Twelve Angry Men, is a play written by Reginald Rose. The play is about the process of individuals and a court case, which is determining the fate of a teenager. It presents the themes of justice, independence and ignorance. Rose emphasises these three themes through the characters and the dialogue. Justice is the principle of moral rightness or equity. This is shown through juror number eight who isn’t sure whether or not the boy is actually innocent or guilty, but he persists to ask questions and convinces the other jurors to think about the facts first. Independence is shown through both juror number three and ten. They both believe that the defendant is guilty until they both realise that they can not relate there past experiences with the court case. Ignorance is shown throughout all the jurors during the play, it is also brought out through the setting of the play.
Prejudices cause peoples’ perceptions to be altered. The jurors are presented quite a bit about the boy’s background, and his records. Juror Ten struggles to see past the stereotypes and judges the boy based on his past actions. Juror Ten claims,” He’s a common ignorant slob. He don’t even speak good English,” (326). What is so ironic about this statement is that Ten claims the boy is dense and bases this claim on the fact that he can’t speak English well. However as corrected by Eleven, it is “doesn’t” not “does”. Perhaps the boy learned from his mistakes and sought to change. That is what life is all about. We fall down and hopefully learn from our mistakes so that we can create a better future for ourselves. Juror Ten is firmly set on the idea that the court covered everything by repeatedly saying, “They proved it,’’ on page 317. Unlike Eight he is not open-minded. As a juror it is important to be skeptics because the in court, lawyers may have presented information in such a way that information is perceived differently. Also crucial information may have not have been analyzed carefully. It’s important not to dwell on the past; its also keep prejudices from exposing you to
Guilty or not guilty? This the key question during the murder trial of a young man accused of fatally stabbing his father. The play 12 Angry Men, by Reginald Rose, introduces to the audience twelve members of a jury made up of contrasting men from various backgrounds. One of the most critical elements of the play is how the personalities and experiences of these men influence their initial majority vote of guilty. Three of the most influential members include juror #3, juror #10, and juror #11. Their past experiences and personal bias determine their thoughts and opinions on the case. Therefore, how a person feels inside is reflected in his/her thoughts, opinions, and behavior.
We are all different. We are all at least biased on one topic. Some people just look at the surface, while others dig deeper into the facts that were given. Reginald Rose demonstrated these points beautifully in 12 Angry Men. All of the Jurors bring a special part of their personality to the jury room, which is the beauty of having a jury. All of the jurors are different in their own unique way,
12 Angry Men is about 12 men who are the jury for an 18 year old accused of murder. The judge states in the opening scene that it is a premeditated murder in the 1st degree, if found guilty will automatically receive the death penalty. The 18 year old male is accused of killing his father with a “one of a kind” switch blade, in their home. The prosecutors have several eye witness testimonies, and all of the evidence that they could need to convict the 18 year old male. In the movie it takes place on the hottest day of the year in New York City. There are 12 jurors whom are to decide if the evidence is enough to convict the teen of murder in the first degree. In the first initial vote it is 11-1. The only way that the jurors could turn in their votes was if there was unanimous vote either guilty or not guilty among the 12 jurors. As the movie progressed the jurors ended up changing their minds as new evidence was brought to their attention by simple facts that were overlooked by the police and prosecutors in the initial investigation. Tempers were raised, and words flew, there was prejudice and laziness of a few of the jurors that affected the amount of time it took to go over all of the eye witness testimonies and evidence. The eye witness testimonies ended up being proven wrong and some of the evidence was thrown out because it was put there under false pretense.
This report is on a movie called, “12 Angry Men.” The movie is about 12 men that are the jury for a case where a young man is being accused of killing his father. A major conflict that is very obvious is the disagreement on whether the young boy was guilty or innocent. After court when all of the men sat down to begin their discussion Courtney B. Vance (#1) Took charge and respectfully was now the leader. He asked what everyone’s votes were and all of the men except for Jack Lemmon (#8) voted the young man was guilty. Because Jack was the odd one that chose differently than the rest of the men, all of the other Jures, were defensive about the evidence just because they were all so confused.
Twelve angry men is a play about twelve jurors who have to decide if the defendant is guilty of murdering his father, the play consist of many themes including prejudice, intolerance, justice , and courage. The play begins with a judge explaining to the jurors their job and how in order for the boy to be sent to death the vote must be unanimous. The jurors are then locked into a small room on a hot summer day. At first, it seems as though the verdict is obvious until juror eight decides to vote not guilty. From that moment on, the characters begin to show their true colors. Some of the characters appear to be biased and prejudice while others just want justice and the truth. Twelve Angry Men Despite many of the negative qualities we see
Twelve Angry Men is a depiction of twelve jurors who deliberate over the verdict of a young defendant accused of murder, highlighting many key communications concepts discussed throughout the semester. One of these concepts was the perspective of a true consensus, the complete satisfaction of a decision by all parties attributed. An array of inferences were illustrated in the movie (some spawning collective inferences) as well as defiance among the jurors. Each of these concepts play a role endorsing, or emphasizing the other. We can analyze the final verdict of the jurors and establish if there was a true consensus affecting their decision. In turn, we can analyze the inferences during the deliberation and directly link how they affect the consensus (or lack thereof). Defiance among the jurors was also directly
...a unanimous vote of not guilty. The final scene takes place signifying the "adjourning stage". Two of the jurors, eight and three exchange the only character names mentioned during the film. The entire process of groupthink occurs in multiple ways that display its symptoms on individual behavior, emotions, and personal filters. These symptoms adversity affected the productivity throughout the juror's debate. In all, all twelve men came to an agreement but displayed group social psychological aspects.
The movie “12 Angry Men” examines the dynamics at play in a United States jury room in the 1950’s. It revolves around the opinions and mindsets of twelve diverse characters that are tasked with pronouncing the guilt or innocence of a young man accused of patricide. The extraordinary element is that their finding will determine his life or death. This play was made into a movie in 1957, produced by Henry Fonda who played the lead role, Juror #8, and Reginald Rose who wrote the original screenplay. This essay will explore some of the critical thinking elements found within the context of this movie, and will show that rational reason and logic when used effectively can overcome the mostly ineffective rush to judgment that can be prevalent in a population. The juror that seemed interesting is Juror #8, who was played by Henry Fonda. Juror #8, or Davis, is an architect, the first dissenter and protagonist in the film. He was the first one to declare that the young man was innocent and he managed to convince the other jurors to see his point of view. Durkheim states that when we respond to deviance, it brings people together (Macionis, 2013, p. 159). We affirm the moral ties that bind us together, which was seen in the movie. At first, almost all of the jurors were so bent on convicting the young man based on their feelings, but they then started to analyze the facts and they came together to make their final decision.
In the play “Twelve Angry men”, the story line presents a variety of perspectives and opinions between twelve very different men. Some are more likely to be pointed out as prejudice, and others are more focused on reaching fair justice. Clearly, it is quite difficult for different people to vote ‘guilty’ or ‘not guilty’ in unity when coming to a fair decision. In all of the twelve jurors, I have chosen Juror 3 and Juror 8 for contrast and comparison. I believe that Juror number 3 is a very opinionated man, with more differences than similarities comparing with Juror number 8.
Yet, the justice system is inevitably susceptible to a flaw, as personal prejudices slip through the initial screening and become apparent in the jury room. In Reginald Rose’s Twelve Angry Men the jury systems imperfections are addressed. He demonstrates the atmosphere of the jury room by introducing twelve characters with unique personalities. A particular character I believe to stand out from the rest would be juror ten. Upon first glance, he comes across as a bigot, but as the play continues he exhibits he is also impatient, arrogant, cantankerous and several other traits.
Different personalities have different effects on situations. Sometimes, you have to dig deeper into someone’s personalities to understand their places. In the film Twelve Angry Men, by Reginald Rose, twelve jurors come together and their different personalities create the whole story. The nature of each character had a different effect on the story. There are ways to simplify personalities by symbolizing them. In Diagram #1, Juror #12 is distant, Juror #8 is in the center, and Juror #3 is inside of Juror #8. These characters have unique dispositions, which creates their exact placement on the diagram. Not only does their placement describe them, but their shapes do too: each shape has certain qualities to represent them. In simple terms, Juror
“Personality is the sum total of everything that constitutes a person's mental, emotional, and temperamental make-up” and it includes all the elements that one must consider when wanting to understand behaviour (Tiffin, Knight and Jackson, 1946). Caspi, Roberts and Shiner, (2005), defines personality as “individual differences in the tendency to behave, think, and feel in certain consistent ways”. According to Allport (1961). “Personality is a dynamic organization, inside the person, of psychophysical systems that create the person’s