PTSD, pain syndromes, traumatic brain injury: these three areas are common features of personal injury cases, often forming the cornerstone of expert testimony. Yet their complex interplay in an individual can make evaluation—and explaining the results in court—extremely difficult. Psychological Knowledge in Court focuses on this triad separately and in combination, creating a unique guide to forensic evaluations that fulfills both legal and clinical standards. Its meticulous review of the literature identifies and provides clear guidelines for addressing core issues in causality, chronicity, and assessment, such as: - Are there any definable risk factors for PTSD? - How prevalent is PTSD after trauma? - How do patients’ emotions relate to their pain experience? - Are current pain assessment methods accurate enough? - What is the role of pre-existing vulnerabilities in traumatic brain injury? - What exactly is "mild" TBI?

Much legal research undertaken by psychologists has had a minimal impact upon law and public policy in the United States. This book diagnoses and offers a blueprint for correcting this fundamental problem.

Expertise in Court: Perspectives on Testimony is the second of a two-volume set on the Psychology of the Courtroom. The authors, a renowned group of psychology and legal scholars, offer definitive coverage of the use of psychological expert testimony and evidence in a variety of legal contexts. They explore the controversies that surround it, from questions of its admissibility to its effects on eventual juror decisions. A wide range of topics are covered including system and estimator variables in eyewitness identification, expert testimony on psychological syndromes, the insanity defence and sexual harassment, how child sexual abuse is used by the courts, and recent research on false confessions. They also provide a comparative analysis exploring how different types of psychological expert testimony and evidence are used by different countries’ legal systems. All the chapters conclude by making specific recommendations for how psychological research and information could be better utilized by courts around the world.

This book is a critical study of the work of legal psychologists, particularly in the United States, and the assumptions upon which the work is based. It rejects an experimentalist model of legal psychology and claims that the use of such a model is not scientific and therefore superior to other ways of analysing the legal system. It proposes ultimately an approach based upon the interpretive nature of human social experience and its effects upon behavior.

During the past two decades, the frequency and range of expert testimony by psychologists have increased dramatically. Courts now routinely hear expert testimony from clinical, cognitive, developmental, and social psychologists. Expert Psychological Testimony for the Courts provides a comprehensive, research-based analysis of the content, ethics, and impact of expert testimony. This book features leading scholars who have contributed to the scientific foundation for expert testimony and who have also served as expert witnesses. The opening chapter explores issues surrounding the admissibility of expert testimony, and the closing chapter explores the ethics and limits of psychological testimony. Each of the intervening chapters focuses on a different area of expert testimony: forensic identification, police interrogations and false confessions, eyewitness identification, sexual harassment, mitigation in capital cases, the insanity defense, battered women, future dangerousness, and child custody. These chapters describe the typical content of expert testimony in a particular area, evaluate the scientific foundation for testimony, examine how jurors respond to expert testimony, and suggest ways in which legal standards or procedures might be modified in light of psychological research. This groundbreaking book should be on the shelf of every social scientist interested in the legal system and every trial attorney who is likely to retain a psychologist as an expert witness. It can also serve as a text for advanced courses in psychology, legal studies, criminal justice, law, and sociology.

In this volume top scholars contribute chapters covering a wide range of topics including jurisprudence, competency, children, forensic risk assessment, eyewitness testimony, jurors and juries, lawsuits, and civil law. Also included is an introductory chapter by the editor. The result is a unique and comprehensive treatment of the issues at the confluence of these disciplines.

Behavioral Analysis, the latest release in the Advanced Forensic Science series, an ongoing reference that grew out of recommendations from the 2009 NAS Report: Strengthening Forensic Science: A Path Forward serves as a graduate level text for those studying and teaching forensic psychology, and is also an excellent reference for forensic psychologists. Coverage includes investigations, death and violence, abuse, other methods and professional issues. Edited by a world-renowned, leading forensic expert, the Advanced Forensic Science series is a long overdue solution for those in the forensic science community. - Provides basic principles of forensic science and an overview of forensic behavioral analysis - Contains sections on investigations, abuse, death and violence - Includes coverage of other methods, such as phonetics and forensic linguistics - Includes a section on professional issues, such as crime scene to court, expert witness testimony, health and safety - Incorporates effective pedagogy, key terms, review questions, discussion questions and additional reading suggestions