I was really surprised at the counterintuitive effect of continuance. I would have guessed that the time delay would reduce the effect of PTP. This would be an interesting topic to continue to evaluate, looking at longer and longer delays, until the effect size is reduced, if it is at all. That could be a potential policy change, especially if we found something like PTP effect disappears after 5 weeks. If something like this effect was found, I think it would then have to be up to the defense whether or not they want to wait.

As far as jury deliberations being thought of as a safeguard for the effects of PTP, I think it really depends on the make up of the jury. Just as the source of the PTP matters, the credibility and persuasiveness of the juror who reminds other jurors to disregard the PTP will have an effect.

Is it not about time that judges and out legal system stopped counting on self-reports to identify potentially biased jurors? Enough data has been collected over the years to demonstrate the inaccuracy and uselessness of self-reports. There has got to be another way. What if some kind of quick test was created that would assess how much knowledge a potential juror had about the trial, maybe using information from a similar trial that has been previously tried.

If the story model is actually how jurors process and filter the information received, isn’t it a distinct advantage to whichever side gives their opening statement and/or evidence first (prosecution), since earlier information biases the interpretation of later information?

Finally, I am very interested in the idea that people who get their news from the newspaper decide which articles they’d like to read and an editor and/or producer decides for those who prefer to get their news from TV.

Since TV watching is so much more popular, it would be an interesting compromise for the legal system to work out a policy change with the television networks. There would still be some ‘freedom of the press’ (newspapers) but potential jurors would not be bombarded with possibly biasing news stories.