Psychologists have long been concerned about the use of eyewitness testimony in the courtroom. Recently, it has been suggested that experimental psychologists should testify as expert witnesses in cases involving eyewitnesses to inform the jury about problems with eyewitness testimony. In this article we examine the arguments offered in favor of the use of expert testimony about eyewitnesses. W...

Expert testimony is an integral part of legal decision making. It informs judges and juries about a wide variety of topics. The assumption underlying its admission is that the average factfinder may lack enough knowledge about scientific or technical topics to make fully informed decisions in the absence of such testimony. Judges and juries are expected to be able to better understand these top...

Mistaken identification testimony by highly confident eyewitnesses has been involved in approximately 72% of the cases in which innocent people have been convicted and later exonerated by DNA testing. Lab studies of eyewitness identification, however, show that mistaken eyewitnesses are usually not highly confident and that there is a useful confidence-accuracy relation that can help distinguis...

In trials witnesses often slant their testimony to advance their interests. To obtain truthful testimony, courts rely on perjury rules. We show that truth-revelation is possible and that perjury rules are not truth-revealing. If the judge uses a truth-revealing mechanism, he will get little testimony because the defendant will not present a witness with unfavorable news; however, testimony is o...