How can empirical science, and psychology in particular, be harnessed to avoid or eliminate unwanted biases? The body of work herein explores this question across twelve experiments. The first approach we consider is placing the onus on the individual to root out any already existing bias within him or herself. Chapter 3, for example, presents experiments that assess whether people (viz., jurors during voir dire) can accurately "self-diagnose" when they are irreparably biased by negative pretrial publicity. (The answer is a resounding no). A second approach is to try and avoid letting bias enter the courtroom in the first place. Chapter 4, for example, provides an experimental test of an institutional solution known as blind expertise, wherein certain biases of an expert witness are avoided by having an intermediary pick the expert, and then having the expert render an opinion before knowing which litigant made the request. In Chapter 7, we consider a third approach to handling bias, one that concedes it will exist in the courtroom. Namely, instruct jurors on the existence of bias, so that they can try to weigh it properly. To this end we test a recently enacted New Jersey instruction on eyewitness testimony. We find that jurors do not become more sensitive to low versus high evidence quality, but instead they discount the eyewitness testimony across the board. Across this inquiry, we deploy several novel tactics; in Chapter 5, for instance, we explore how continuous response measurement (CRM) can provide unique insights into the study of reasoning, and in particular how jurors parse trial evidence. We end in chapter 8 with a more general discussion of how behavioral science can be applied across law and policy.

<p>Much has been researched in South Africa about the trauma of losing one&rsquo / s home, one&rsquo / s community and rebuilding one&rsquo / s life in a new environment. Several books have been published tracking the lives of the forcibly removed and their responses to leaving District Six. My research focuses on a different group namely those who had been forcibly removed from the centre of Stellenbosch, called &ldquo / Die Vlakte&rdquo / during that time. Living and working with and among people who have experienced this removal, I was keen to research whether the impact of the trauma is currently&nbsp / manifesting in this specific community and if so, what the symptoms would be. This qualitative inquiry focuses on one particular individual, Mr. Hilton Biscombe. I selected him because he, who experienced the removal as a teenager, spent most of his later life determinedly collecting stories and documents relating to this incident. Mr. Biscombe is also the only person of whom I am aware who responded personally through compiling a book, making a DVD, writing poetry as well as an autobiography relating to this event. My inquiry into the ways trauma manifests in a narrative, will be based on two interviews: one conducted by a white man from the University of Stellenbosch thirty years after the event / and another interview, six years later, conducted by myself.Our understanding of trauma is usually associated with a death or injury or the possibility thereof, but it could also include the victim&rsquo / s response to extreme fear, serious harm or threat to&nbsp / family members. According to van der Merwe and Vienings, people also become traumatized when witnessing harm, physical violence or death or the sudden loss or destruction of a victim&rsquo / s home (van der Merwe &amp / Vienings, 2001). So the issue of trauma is not in question, nor the fact that forced removals cause trauma. I am exploring testimony in the form of interviews for possible current manifestations of this trauma thirty-six years down the line.</p>

Ce mémoire porte sur le travail de l’intertextualité dans les quatre oeuvres que Jorge Semprun (1923-) a consacrées à ses souvenirs de déportation au camp de Buchenwald : Le grand voyage (1963), Quel beau dimanche! (1980), L’écriture ou la vie (1994) et Le mort qu’il faut (2001). Chaque oeuvre poursuit la recherche d’un langage approprié à la narration d’une expérience qui résiste obstinément à sa représentation. L’intertextualité, de même que les réminiscences musicales, filmiques ou picturales, composent chez Semprun une image complexe de l’expérience du déporté, faisant coexister l’ombre et la lumière, l’angoisse et la joie, le mal radical et la fraternité, loin de tout cliché manichéen. Il s’agira ici de lire ce témoignage magnifique sur les camps nazis comme un dialogue profond entre l’art et la barbarie, la création et la destruction, la mémoire culturelle et la mémoire traumatique. / This essay covers the issue of intertextuality in the four works that Jorge Semprun (1923-) wrote about his memories from Buchenwald : Le grand voyage (1963), Quel beau dimanche! (1980), L’écriture ou la vie (1994) and Le mort qu’il faut (2001). Each work stems from the search of an apropriate language for narrating an experience that poses a radical challenge to its représentation. Intertextuality, as well as memories of works of art, yield a complex image of the experience of a survivor, where shadow and light, anguish and joy, Radical Evil and fraternity coexist, far away from the traditional cliché. The objective here is to read Semprun’s wounderfull testimonies as a profound dialogue between art and the Holocaust, creation and destruction, cultural memory and traumatic memory.

Recently, expert testimony in sexual assault trials shifted from an emphasis on Rape Trauma Syndrome (RTS) to Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and experts have tied these diagnoses either loosely or tightly to the victim’s condition following sexual assault. In the current study, 326 jury-eligible adults completed a survey on Amazon Mechanical Turk in which they read a synopsis of a sexual assault trial and an expert testimony with either RTS, PTSD or neither; along with either no, loose, or tight links made between the diagnosis and the victim’s condition. There was no main effect of diagnosis label but testimony linkage did have an effect on verdicts. Women gave more guilty verdicts due to their lower levels of Rape Myth Acceptance (RMA), and the effect of gender partially depended on RMA. Implications for how expert testimony can affect defendants’ and plaintiffs’ credibility are discussed.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of British Columbia, 1999. / Title from PDF t.p. (viewed Sept. 22, 2005). Includes bibliographical references and index. Issued also in microfiche. Issued also in print.

Få polisanmälda sexualbrott mot barn leder till åtal. Det kan bero på att barnets utsaga, vilken ofta är den huvudsakliga bevisningen, inte bedöms nå upp till rättens beviskrav. Vuxnas generella förmåga att avgöra tillförlitlighet i barns utsagor är låg och i rättspraxis värderas utsagor utifrån kriterier såsom detaljrikedom, logik och konstans – kriterier som inte är anpassade till barnets värld samt ibland har bristande empiriskt stöd. Syftet var därför att undersöka vilka kriterier svenska domstolar åberopar i tillförlitlighetsbedömning av målsägandeutsagan vid sexualbrott mot barn. Etthundra domar från år 2017 analyserades utifrån kriterier från rättspraxis (NJA 2010 s 671), utsagepsykologisk forskning (SVA:s CBCA) samt utvecklingspsykologiska aspekter. I resultatet syns fokus på generellt hållna kriterier enligt praxis, medan forskningsbaserade specifikt hållna kriterier särskilt anpassade för barn som utsatts för sexuallbrott användes i låg grad. Den utvecklingspsykologiska kunskapen hos domstolarna framstod som generell och i liten grad anpassad till olika barns utvecklingsstadier. I diskussionen argumenteras för att ökad användning av fler forskningsbaserade kriterier särskilt anpassade för barn samt dito utvecklingspsykologiska kunskaper, förhoppningsvis skulle kunna öka lagföringsgraden och därvid ha positiv spridningseffekt på anmälningsbenägenhet, synen på rättsväsendets legitimitet samt den allmänna graden av rättvisa i samhället. Avslutningsvis omformuleras rådande utsageanalytiska riktlinjer från Högsta Domstolen utifrån utsagepsykologisk forskning. / Few reported cases of sexual crime against children lead to prosecution. This might depend on the child’s testimony – often the main evidence – which doesn’t satisfy the court’s requirement for evidence. The general capacity of an adult to determine reliability in children’s testimonies is low. In legal usage, testimonies are valued by the use of criteria such as quantity of details, logic and constancy, which may not be adjusted to fit a child and sometimes lacks empirical support. This study examined which criteria the Swedish courts invoke with reliability assessments of the plaintiff’s testimony in sexual crimes against children. One hundred grounds for decisions from 2017 were examined from legal usage (NJA 2010 s 671), testimonial research (SVA’s CBA), and developmental psychological aspects. The results found a focus on general maintained criteria according to practice, while research based criteria, adjusted specifically for the different ages of children who have been victims of sexual crime, were however used to a low degree. The developmental psychological knowledge seems general and to a low degree adjusted to the various developmental stages of children. Finally, it is argued that increased usage of more research based criteria, adjusted to suit children and such child psychological knowledge, could increase the prosecution degree. This would have a positive multiplying effect on crime reporting tendencies, the view of the justice’s legitimacy, and the general degree of justice in society. Lastly, the testimonial guidelines of the Swedish high court are redefined from testimonial research.

Les événements d’Auschwitz, d’Hiroshima et du 11 septembre 2001 ravivent un questionnement ancien sur le pouvoir du langage, ainsi que sur la responsabilité et les modes du témoignage. Tenter de dépasser les interdits de la représentation dans ce contexte historique relève d’un acte de résistance envers tous les préceptes linguistiques, éthiques, épistémologiques ou politiques. Écrivains juifs-américains séculiers et polymorphes, Paul Auster et Jerome Rothenberg redéfinissent le réel grâce à l’imagination, à la mutation du medium et au dérèglement des sens dans leurs textes défigurés. S’inscrivant dans la rupture d’après 1945, ils recherchent une voie détournée, un langage premier et organique dépassant l’inadéquation du signe et l’impulsion iconoclaste. S’inspirant d’un héritage juif diasporique et mystique, des avant-gardes européennes et américaines, du transcendantalisme, du rituel archaïque ou encore du poststructuralisme, ils contribuent au renversement des images mythiques issues de la spéculation sémiotique. Le trauma ne peut être dit, mais se crie, la présence s’écrit dans la répétition et dans la rencontre de l’infini, le cœur de l’œuvre se dévoile dans l’excentration et l’excentricité de la lettre pétrifiée. Dire l’indicible, c’est se taire et écouter la mort qui sommeille dans l’ombre du verbe, dans le silence d’une musique naissante ; c’est rêver éveillé, se remémorer les pulsions et les cauchemars enfouis ; c’est accueillir une non-langue conjuguée à contretemps dans une grammaire du désastre. Traduire une parole qui ne dit rien et qui ne peut être comprise, telle est la contradiction qui informe ces écrits en souffrance. / Auschwitz, Hiroshima and September 11, 2001 revive the ancient issues of the power of language and of the responsibility and modes of testimony. Trying to overcome the taboos and restrictions of representation in this historical context is a matter of resistance against all linguistic, ethical, epistemological and political precepts. Paul Auster and Jerome Rothenberg are multi-faceted secular Jewish-American writers who redefine the real thanks to the imagination, thanks to medium mutation and the derangement of the senses in their disfigured texts. Coming within the scope of the post-1945 breakdown, they seek a roundabout means, a primal and organic language overcoming the discrepancy of signs and the iconoclast impulse. Drawing from a diasporic and mystical Jewish heritage, from the European and American avant-gardes, from transcendentalism, from archaic ritual and postructuralism, they contribute to bringing down the mythical images shaped by semiotic speculation. Trauma cannot be said, but the wound is voiced in a scream. Presence writes itself in the repetition and the discovery of infinity. Depth is unveiled by a whirligig of nameless sticks and stones. Speaking the unspeakable means keeping quiet and listening to the death that sleeps in the shadow of the word, in the silence of a new song. It means daydreaming, recollecting repressed drives and nightmares; cradling a no-tongue conjugated in a grammar of the disaster. Translating a word that says nothing, that cannot be understood, such is the contradiction which informs these pending works of pain.

Cette étude décrit la singulière conception de la responsabilité qui se dégage des œuvres de Marguerite Duras sur la Seconde Guerre mondiale, en raison de son approche unique des thèmes de l'altérité (internes et externes) et des « Autres ». Mon étude montre comment les œuvres de Duras (les textes littéraires et les films) créent une interaction entre la mémoire et l'histoire, d'une manière qui offre une alternative aux récits et narratives dominantes de son époque. Mon analyse de l’œuvre de Duras se base sur trois cadres théoriques: une approche historique de la France, de la Seconde Guerre mondiale et de la mémoire collective française de ces années ; une perspective féministe de l'écriture des femmes sur la guerre ; et enfin, les théories du témoignage de l'Holocauste. Cette analyse multidisciplinaire, historique, culturelle, philosophique et éthique, me permet de démontrer comment les œuvres de Duras contribuent à la discussion publique autour de la responsabilité de la France par rapport à son histoire. Plus largement, mon étude permet de repenser le concept de « témoignage » et ses fonctions éthiques. Mon argument principal est que la lecture des œuvres de Duras en tant que témoignage offre une voie alternative concernant les questions historiques et les questions de la mémoire, de la narration et de la représentation. Cette lecture permet également de reconsidérer des concepts multi-niveaux tels que : la guerre, les relations de genre en temps de guerre, la vengeance, l’ennemi, la torture et la justice. Par conséquent, à travers l’analyse des œuvres de fiction et des récits autobiographiques de Duras, l'étude démontre comment la pratique du témoignage de l’auteure peut interpeller les lectrices et les lecteurs, en les encourageant à assumer une responsabilité au présent pour les événements du passé. / This study describes the unique conception of responsibility derived from Marguerite Duras' works about World War II by virtue of her unique approach in these works to the themes of otherness (both internal and external) and "Others." It demonstrates how Duras' works (both texts and films) create an interplay between memory and history in a way that offers an alternative to the dominant narratives of her era as well as to its dominant modes of narration. The discussion unfolds within three theoretical frameworks: the historical discourse about France in WWII and about the French collective memory of these years; the feminist discourse about women's writing on war; and the discourse about Holocaust testimony. This historical, cultural, and philosophical-ethical multidisciplinary analysis allows me to demonstrate how Duras' works contribute to the ongoing discussion about the French responsibility concerning their history and at the same time, more broadly, to rethink the concept of "testimony" and testimony’s ethical functions. My main argument is that reading Duras' works as testimonies offers an alternative way of relating to questions of history, memory, narration, and representation, as well as to the meanings of multilayered concepts such as war, gender power relations in war, revenge, enemy, torture, and justice. Hence, the study demonstrates through the fictional and autobiographic works of Duras how the practice of testimony can involve an assumption of responsibility for past events in the present.

Cette thèse porte sur les évolutions des médiations dans les musées de la Résistance, plus particulièrement dans ceux de Bondues, Lyon et Nantua. Elle s'intéresse au passage de pratiques testimoniales présentielles à des pratiques numériques utilisant des enregistrements audiovisuels dřanciens résistants-témoins dans des espaces d'exposition. Elle explore la nature de ce lien entre ces deux types de pratiques. Le questionnement, ancré dans la théorie de la trivialité et axé sur la transmission, porte sur les rapports de présence qu'exercent directement ou indirectement les témoins au cours des transformations des trois musées, qui donnent aujourd'hui à voir des enregistrements de témoignage. Les analyses prennent en compte le retrait progressif des témoins et les modalités d'appropriation des vidéos par les médiateurs, au travers, notamment, de leur éventuelle participation aux captations audiovisuelles et à la conception de dispositifs scéniques. L'ensemble de l'étude, qui comprend aussi l'évaluation de la réception de témoignages présentiels et de certains dispositifs numériques, met en exergue trois ressorts transversaux aux médiations testimoniales présentielles, audiovisuelles, et leur mise en oeuvre : la sensibilité, les figures de résistant et le territoire. Les liens ainsi maintenus au travers des médiations avec les témoins disparus passent par lřappropriation que les médiateurs-témoignaires font des enregistrements. Cette dernière constitue lřun des vecteurs essentiels dans les transmissions de témoignages étudiées, et fait ressortir un enjeu au niveau de la diversité des pratiques des témoignaires dans notre capacité à garder vivante une part de ce qui nous relie aux témoins disparus. / This research focuses on the evolution of cultural practices of testimonies in three museums dedicated to the French Resistance, situated in the cities of Bondues, Lyon, and Nantua. In the late decade, the last war witnesses who had used to share their memories in-person, coming to the museums, have been gradually ceasing their activities because of their age. This research aims to understand how this emptiness is being filled with new testimonial practices based on audiovisual technologies and how a link is being kept with the witnesses. The study found out that the history of each museum shapes the way how these institutions consider testimonies today. The analysis also revealed the common processes of mediation within the chain that can be defined as : Ŗtestimonial experiences with the in-person witness Ŕ conception of audiovisual mediations with testimonies Ŕ testimonial experiences with audiovisual devicesŗ: sensitivity, figures of Resistance veterans and territories. Thus, the sensitive connection with the former in-person witnesses is being kept through the way how each mediator pursues the video recordings. The way of handling videos appeared to be a major factor in the way of keeping track with the past witnesses and then, in the transmission of testimonies. As a consequence, it highlighted the importance of maintaining the diversity of cultural practices of mediators to preserve a sensitive connection with the past.

This thesis entitled "Psychological Aspects of Interrogation of Children" deals with the psychological aspects of interrogation of sexually abused children aged six to twelve. The thesis is divided into two parts. The first section consists of five chapters and it focuses on theoretical knowledge. There is described expert knowledge about children´s development, interrogation, the output interrogation, i.e. testimony, and specifics of interrogation of children. The second part processes the results of the actual research. The research objective of the thesis was to identify psychological aspects which affect the interrogation of children, to determine and describe them. In this thesis qualitative research was used to achieve the aim, especially a part of the grounded theory method. In my research I termed eleven categories aspects which influence the interrogation of children. These categories are described in detail in the chapters entitled Result and they are discussed in detail. This thesis can serve to individual institutions involved in criminal proceedings concerning juvenile offenders as well as to general public.