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Full-Text Articles in Law
Predicting Variation In Endowment Effect Magnitudes, Owen D. Jones, C. Jaeger, S. Brosnan, D. Levin
Predicting Variation In Endowment Effect Magnitudes, Owen D. Jones, C. Jaeger, S. Brosnan, D. Levin
Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications
Hundreds of studies demonstrate human cognitive biases that are both inconsistent with “rational” decisionmaking and puzzlingly patterned. One such bias, the “endowment effect” (also known as “reluctance to trade”), occurs when people instantly value an item they have just acquired at a much higher price than the maximum they would have paid to acquire it. This bias impedes a vast range of real-world transactions, making it important to understand. Prior studies have documented items that do or do not generate endowment effects, and have noted that the effects vary in magnitude. But none has predicted any of the substantial between-item …
"Carhart", Constitutional Rights, And The Psychology Of Regret, Chris Guthrie
"Carhart", Constitutional Rights, And The Psychology Of Regret, Chris Guthrie
Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications
In "Gonzales v. Carhart", the Supreme Court upheld the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act. In so doing, the Court used the prospect of regret to justify limiting choice. Relying on empirical evidence documenting the four ways in which regret actually operates, this Article argues that the Court's analysis reflects a fundamental misunderstanding of the psychology of regret. By exposing the Court's misunderstanding of this emotion, this article seeks to minimize the most significant risk posed by the Carhart decision: that states will use the prospect of regret to justify additional constraints not only on the abortion right but also on other …
Blinking On The Bench: How Judges Decide Cases, Chris Guthrie, Andrew J. Wistrich
Blinking On The Bench: How Judges Decide Cases, Chris Guthrie, Andrew J. Wistrich
Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications
How do judges judge? Do they apply law to facts in a mechanical and deliberative way, as the formalists suggest they do, or do they rely on hunches and gut feelings, as the realists maintain? Debate has raged for decades, but researchers have offered little hard evidence in support of either model. Relying on empirical studies of judicial reasoning and decision making, we propose an entirely new model of judging that provides a more accurate explanation of judicial behavior. Our model accounts for the tendency of the human brain to make automatic, snap judgments, which are surprisingly accurate, but which …