By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: If a manufacturer rushes an untested new product to market, did they do it to realize a gain (let’s say to increase profits by expanding into a new market) or to prevent or mitigate a loss (maybe to protect the company against an economic downturn)? The difference in this case […]
To Convince on Negligence, Frame It as “Gain” Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: There are a number of scenarios where race might matter to your case. Most obviously in the civil realm, these could be employment cases, police use of force cases, or claims involving unequal medical care or testing. In any number of other cases, race could come up as a factor
Need to Talk About Race in Trial? Watch for Language Polarization Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: It has been a rough couple of years for science. Our newly-unmasked population seems to be more divided than ever about our ability to rely on science in applying systematic and neutral procedures in order to find reliable answers to the questions that matter. A sizable chunk of the population
Address Anti-Expert Bias: 5 Ways Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: Many of us probably watched or heard about the drama this past week in the Women’s Olympic Figure Skating event. Kamila Valieva — just 15-years-old, but with a dominant combination of quad-jumps and world class performance style — tested positive for a banned substance. What followed for the Russian skater
Learn from Attitudes Toward Sports Abuse Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: In my opinion, it is one of the most interesting and important areas of social science at the moment. And if it’s not that, then it’s certainly the sassiest. A group of researchers has been focused on our susceptibility and resistance to various forms of bad information, disinformation, misinformation, rumors,
Countering the Bad Expert: Don’t Expect Jurors to Deliberate Past the BS on Their Own Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: Recognizing and reducing bias is obviously essential in a litigation context. But when it comes to “de-biasing,” it helps to see instructions as one tool in the toolbox, but not a tool that’s guaranteed to fix everything. In a recent post, I wrote about a pre-instruction on hindsight that shows some
Be Cautious About Instructing Your Way Out of Bias Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: How likely is it that a corporation’s competitor could come up with a parallel product without infringing a patent? How common is it for someone to get injured on an amusement park ride? How normal would it be for someone who gets regular physical exams to have an undiagnosed stage
Use Jurors’ Availability Bias Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: Every jury selection involves a variety of issues relating to how potential jurors could feel about the specific case. But there is one issue that is relevant in every current jury selection for an in-person trial: What is the person’s comfort level in sharing relatively close quarters indoors for long
Understanding the COVID-Gamblers in Your Jury Pool Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm: At the voir dire stage of a jury trial, the word “bias” gets used a lot. But do we really know what it means? The courts, in practice at least, hew to a simple meaning: If a potential juror admits to bias, that means they know they can’t be fair
See the Social Roots of Bias Read More »
By Dr. Ken Broda Bahm Traditionally, we might think about what happens in the jury room as a kind of “Black box,” an unknown process with jurors keeping their secrets on how they got to their verdicts. In practice, however, we know a fair amount about what’s in that “box.” Based on both scholarly research
Better Instructions: Make Your Jurors Accountable Devil’s Advocates Read More »