What is Psychology and Law?
Division 41: American PsychologyLaw Society
History of Psychology and Law
 Hugo Munsterberg’s (1908) On the Witness Stand
 Early court cases
 Brown v. Board of Education (1954)
 Jenkins v. United States (1962)
 Establishment of specialized professional journals
 Law and Human Behavior, Criminal Justice and Behavior, Behavioral
Sciences and the Law, and Psychology, Public Policy and the Law
 Creation of professional organizations
 American Psychology-Law Society, International Association for
Correctional and Forensic Psychology, American Board of Forensic
Psychologists
What is Psychology and Law?
 Anything within the intersection of the law and
psychology
 Clinical aspects of psychology and law
 e.g., violence risk assessment, competency, insanity, public
policy
 Experimental aspects of psychology and law
 Subspecialties of developmental, social, cognitive,
community psychology and neuropsychology
 e.g., jury decision making, eyewitness testimony, and the
impact of expert testimony
Experimental Areas of Psychology
and Law
 Jury Decision Making Methodologies
 Uses archival methods to examine actual verdicts
 Uses actual jurors to examine potential verdicts
 Uses mock jurors to represent functioning of actual
jurors
 may be college students or members of the general public
 exposed to facts of the case in the form of a brief scenario
or vignette, lengthy trial transcript, or videotape
reenactment of a real trial
 may make individual decisions as jurors or deliberate as
juries before rendering a verdict
Predictors of Juror and jury decision
making
 Individual Differences
 Demographics (e.g., gender, age, income, education,
religion, or race)
 Personality (belief in a just world, locus of control,
socialization, or authoritarianism)
 Attitudinal variables related to specific types of
cases (sexual assaults or death penalty) or specific
topics (homosexuality)
 Such findings are applicable to jury selection
Predictors of Juror and Jury
Decision making
 Courtroom and case factors
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Composition of jury
Jury size
Comprehension of judicial instructions
Case type
Extra-legal factors
 Pretrial publicity
 Emotion
 Juror note taking and questioning of witnesses
Impact of Evidentiary Psycholegal
Research
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Eyewitnesses
Expert witnesses
Coerced or involuntary confessions
Hearsay evidence
Statistical or probability evidence (e.g., DNA
cases)
 Elaborate displays of evidence ( e.g., computer
animated displays, photographs)
Clinical Areas of Psychology and
Law
 Treatment of Forensic and Correctional Offenders
 Forensic offenders
 institutionalized in mental health treatment centers and
 Correctional offenders
 institutionalized in jails and prisons
 Treatment focus
 Mental health
 e.g., Treatment for depression
 Specific psycholegal issue
 e.g., restore to competency
Forensic Assessment
 Consists of a psychologist evaluating an individual for
a matter important to a criminal or civil court
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Competency to Stand Trial
Criminal Responsibility or Insanity
Risk Assessment
Personal Injury Claims
Child Custody and Parental Fitness
Family Violence
Juvenile Transfer and Treatment Amenability
Malingering
Current Issues
 Communication of psychological research to the
legal arena
 Application of risk assessment to individual
cases
 Ecological validity of mock juror research
 Recruitment of diverse group of scholars
 Examination of neglected areas such as the civil
law
Careers and Training
 Employment Opportunities
 Research (colleges and universities, government, and private
agencies)
 Clinical practice
 Consultation with courts and lawyers
 Graduate Study in Psychology and Law
 Master’s Degree or Doctoral Degree
 Ph.D or Psy.D.
 Joint degree programs (e.g., PHD/JD), specialized programs,
or general programs
Resources
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ap-ls.org/
aplsstudentsection.com/
http://www.aa4cfp.org/
http://www.abfp.com/
Encyclopedia of Psychology and Law