The legal standard for dishonesty needs to be reviewed because jurors’ widely different views may be affecting the outcome of trials, criminologists say.

Research has revealed huge variations in ordinary people’s ideas of what is dishonest behaviour, which may affect a defendant's chances of being convicted or acquitted by a jury.

The findings, from a study by Emily Finch and Stefan Fafinski, of Brunel University, question whether the present legal definition of dishonesty is appropriate. Jurors are asked to decide whether a defendant’s actions were “honest according to the standards of reasonable and honest people”. The research suggests that no such universal standard for honesty exists.

Women, the study found, are more likely than men to see ethically dubious actions as dishonest, but men are more likely to vote to convict a defendant accused of these actions. For example, 92 per cent of women thought that it was dishonest to make an insurance claim for pre-existing damage to a car, compared with 85 per cent of men. Only 47 per cent of women, however, would be prepared to convict somebody of fraud on this basis, compared with 55 per cent of men.

Age is another strong influence on perceptions of dishonesty, with older people taking a tougher line in all but a few cases. People are also less likely to consider an action dishonest if they have done it themselves.

The results, from an online test of more than 15,000 volunteers, suggest that attitudes to honesty are so variable that the legal standard needs to be revised, Dr Finch and Dr Fafinski told the British Science Festival at the University of Surrey in Guildford.

Under the present system, two defendants accused of the same crime may stand different chances of being convicted according to the sex and age profile of the jury, and according to whether any jurors have committed similar acts of dishonesty themselves.

“The law is based upon an assumption that the majority of people hold the same views about what conduct is dishonest,” the researchers said. “Our research challenges that assumption, as we found that there is a great deal of disagreement among people, even upon very basic situations.”

In the “Honesty Lab” research, Dr Finch and Dr Fafinski, both criminal lawyers, asked participants about insurance fraud, student plagiarism or theft from an employer. Each volunteer was asked whether they felt a particular action was dishonest, whether they would convict somebody of it, and whether they had done it themselves. The results showed wides variation, even in apparently cut-and-dried cases: more than 3 per cent felt that it was not dishonest to take a DVD from a shop without paying for it.

“The central factor in dishonesty is what does society make of the conduct,” Dr Finch said. “The law expects that we all agree on that. However, our theory was that people don’t agree on that. We thought there would be agreement on the most extreme examples. We thought everybody would agree it’s dishonest to take a DVD from a shop without paying.”

The researchers are now planning further research in a mock courtroom. They suspect that the presence of a judge and barristers and peer pressure in the jury room may influence people to take a different view of honesty.

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