JUROR ASSESSMENTS OF THE BELIEVABILITY OF EXPERT WITNESSES: A LITERATURE REVIEW

Although a heated debate about the use of expert witnesses rages, that debate has been grounded in anecdotes rather than rigorous study. One issue that has received scant attention is the role that the expert's field of expertise, as contrasted with the characteristics of the jurors or experts, plays in juror assessments of believability. This issue is important because courts often apply different levels of scrutiny to expert testimony from the hard and soft sciences, based on their assump? tions about how jurors assess this testimony. This article reviews this differential approach and the research relevant to juror assessments of expert believability.