Psychology and the Law: When the Rubber Meets the Road

How can it practically be improved?

In his previous talk in 2020, Itiel Dror showed that biases plague experts which the legal system heavily considers (incorrectly) as objective and impartial. In this talk, he will use cognitive research to show the psychological mechanisms by which forensic and other experts make biased and unreliable decisions. Then he will present the expanded Linear Sequential Unmasking (LSU-E) as a practical way to mitigate these issues and improve expert decision making. (you can attend this talk even if you did not attend the previous event, but this is recommended as non-mandatory background reading: https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.analchem.0c00704 )

Itiel Dror (PhD Harvard) is a cognitive neuroscientist who is interested in the cognitive architecture that underpins expert decision making. Dror's research, published in over 150 research articles, demonstrated how contextual information can influence judgments and decision making of experts. He has worked in a variety of domains, from policing and aviation, to medical experts and bankers, showing that even hard working and competent experts can make unintentional errors in evaluating data. Dror has worked with many agencies in various countries to minimize error and enhance decision making. More information is at: www.cci-hq.com 

Recently Science magazine wrote a feature describing Dr. Itiel Dro's research: https://www.science.org/content/article/forensic-experts-biased-scientists-claims-spark-outrage