Reducing the hindsight bias utilizing attorney closing arguments.

In the legal system, jurors are asked to render a decision after the event in question has already occurred and the final outcome, typically negative, is known. This "after-the-fact" structure of the legal system makes jurors susceptible to a human judgment phenomenon known as hindsight bias. This study focused on reducing hindsight bias in a courtroom context by incorporating a debiasing strategy within the defense's closing argument. Subjects viewed one of three videotaped versions of plaintiff and defense closing arguments in a commercial litigation case (i.e., foresight condition, hindsight condition, and hindsight debiasing condition). Results indicate that the hindsight debiasing strategy was effective in reducing subject-juror hindsight bias.

Making attributions to the physician following closing arguments of a simulated medical malpractice suit: jurors' sex, health locus of control, and locus of authority.

This study examined jurors' health locus of control, locus of authority, sex, and attribution assigned to the physician in a simulated trial by subject-jurors. Subjects viewed videotaped closing arguments of a fictionalized medical malpractice case and assigned fault to each party in the case. The primary finding was that women tended to assign greater responsibility (57.00%) to the physician than did men (37.92%).

The predictive validity of subtle and obvious empirically derived psychological test items under faking conditions.

The relative contributions of subtle and obvious item endorsements to the prediction of a relevant criterion were assessed under faking and control ("honest") conditions. The MMPI and a nonconformity questionnaire were first administered to 100 male college students. Items on the Pd scale and 101 additional MMPI items that correlated significantly with the nonconformity questionnaire were then rated by 38 other male college students for apparent relationship to psychopathology. From these ratings, a scale (designated PdX) was constructed, which consisted of 21 subtle and 21 obvious items. After a third group of 98 male college students completed the nonconformity questionnaire, they were asked to respond to the items of the Pd and PdX subscales under control, fake-good, and fake-bad instructions. Significant correlations between the nonconformity scale and certain PdX and Pd subscales were found only for the control group. Implications for test construction and for clinical interpretation under faking conditions are discussed.