Reliability and validity of the original and revised legal attitudes questionnaire

The Legal Attitudes Questionnaire (LAQ) predicts juror bias, but there is little evidence concerning its reliability and construct validity. Two studies provide such evidence for two versions of the LAQ. In Study 1 a questionnaire containing both versions of the LAQ, measures of related and unrelated constructs, and demographic questions was completed by 294 undergraduates. In Study 2 a shortened questionnaire was completed by 102 jury-eligible adults. In both studies, the revised version of the LAQ was superior to the original LAQ in terms of missing data, internal reliability, and construct validity. A refined version of the revised scale is presented, evaluated, and recommended for future use.This article is an expanded version of a poster presented at the meeting of the American Psychology and Law Society in March, 1992. We are grateful to Barbara Martin and Ray Wolfe for their comments on a previous version of this article. We would like to thank Sean Henriques, Tracy Chavez, Jennifer Devenport, Alex Milov, and Cathy Mucha for their assistance in data acquisition, entry, and verification. Finally, we thank the Miami Beach Kiwanis for participating in this study.