Comparing legal attitudes of Anglo- and Latino-Americans: Confirming the factor structure of the Legal Attitudes Questionnaire.

The Legal Attitudes Questionnaire (LAQ) is a commonly used measure of juror bias; however, the factor structure of the English-language version of this measure has yet to be confirmed. This research compared the model fit of three competing models of the English-language LAQ within 504 Anglo-American and 290 Latino-American students. Results indicated that the Couch and Sundre (2001) three-factor structure provided the best fit to the LAQ. Latent mean differences indicated that Latino-Americans endorsed more authoritarian attitudes and more negative views of the police than Anglo-Americans. Interpretation of these findings and implications for future use are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]