“Bending” Evidence for a Cause: Scholar‐Advocacy Bias in Family Law

There are a number of salient public policy issues in the family law field that have invoked impassioned policy debates on a recurrent basis. In the absence of a body of research to address these critical concerns, advocates under the guise of social science scholarship have exacerbated the confusion and controversy by construing the scant available research evidence to justify their own ends, without regard to the relevance, quality, utility, and limitations of the studies. This is one of two articles on this problem that we have named “scholar‐advocacy bias.” In this article, we discuss the difference between truth in social science and truth in law. We identify common ways in which social science researchers and reviewers of research—wittingly or unwittingly—can become advocates for ideological positions and social policies at the expense of being balanced reporters of research evidence as illustrated by recent debates about overnight parenting of infants and toddlers. We also consider how adherence to established scientific principles and methods prevents the misuse of research in this way.     

Interpersonal violence as social construction: the potentially undermining role of claims making and advocacy statistics

The relationship between empirical research inquiry and advocacy efforts is complex and seldom addressed in the interpersonal violence literature. In this article, we first examine how social conditions come to be seen as social problems, using a social constructionist perspective. Next, we focus specifically on the problem of interpersonal violence as viewed through a social constructionist lens, highlighting the many ways in which advocacy has influenced public perceptions of interpersonal violence as a social problem. Finally, this article considers some of the consequences that may result from exaggerated or misleading claims, especially when they are made by social scientists who are presumably engaged in an objective discussion of a problem. These consequences include generating skepticism toward the social sciences, feeding a backlash movement, and diverting attention away from the most severe forms of interpersonal violence. Contrary to the goals of many advocates, some of these consequences may be detrimental to the very social problems they hope to alleviate.     

The Role of Emotion in Land Regulation: An Empirical Study of Online Advocacy in Authoritarian Asia

Scholarly interest about online advocacy in authoritarian settings is rapidly growing. With one of Asia's most active social media, Vietnam offers a promising site to investigate how online advocates navigate around state censorship to influence regulatory decisionmaking. Much research about online advocacy focuses on rational discourse, and fails to ask why satire and ridicule can change regulatory outcomes when reasoned debate fails. This article considers two cases studies where online advocates changed regulatory outcomes in Vietnam. It investigates why the regulators were sensitive to moral censure in social media, and responded to appeals for solidarity, but were reluctant to engage in rational public deliberation. These findings reveal insights into how online advocacy can trigger emotional responses in officials that transform the regulatory environment. The article concludes that rather than constituting cognitive missteps, emotions are integral to government regulation in Vietnam.     

Can twitter change the Iranian legal landscape for women?

ABSTRACT

This article explores the effectiveness of international social media (Twitter) campaigns, as a modern form of transnational advocacy networks, seeking domestic legal change in Iran for women’s rights. Using the spiral model of human rights change and second wave normative theories, the article critiques current thought on social media as an advocacy tool using evidence from two Iranian campaigns. Gathering empirical data from the #stopstoning and #letwomengotostadium campaigns, the research finds that Twitter campaigns may be linked to regression in some areas of women’s rights. Early evidence indicates that social media may lead to amplified government backlash, lack of campaign persistence and foreign overshadowing of domestic voices, which all contribute to the ongoing problematisation of the role of transnational advocacy networks in domestic human rights change.     

Law School Climates: Job Satisfaction Among Tenured US Law Professors

In this article, we combine quantitative and qualitative methods to investigate why post‐tenure law professors of color and women professors within the US legal academy are differentially dissatisfied with their work lives. Previous social science research has indicated lingering difficulties for professionals from traditionally marginalized groups as they advance to higher levels. Post‐tenure law professors have been understudied relative to similar senior‐level professionals. Mixed methods allow us to isolate institutional structure and implicit cultural bias as key mediators of this dissatisfaction, converging on issues of respect, voice, and collegiality as crucial. We use the example of the legal academy to show how empirical research can shed important light on the realities of legal professionals—here, the faculty who are training the next generation of US attorneys. Following in the new legal realist tradition, we demonstrate the power of mixed empirical methodologies for grasping social realities pertinent to law.     

Detecting deception in second‐language speakers

Purpose. We examined whether language proficiency had an impact on lie detection. Methods. We collected video footage of 30 targets who spoke English as their native or second language and who lied or told the truth about a transgression. Undergraduate students (N = 51) then judged the veracity of these 30 clips and indicated how confident they were in their ratings. Results. Participants were more confident when judging native‐language truth‐tellers than second‐language truth‐tellers. In addition, participants were more likely to exhibit a truth‐bias when observing native‐language speakers, whereas they were more likely to exhibit a lie‐bias when viewing second‐language speakers. Conclusions. Given the difficulties and biases associated with second‐language lie detection, further research is needed.     

Interpersonal Racial Discrimination,Ethnic-racial Socialization,and Offending: Risk and Resilience among African American Females

Evidence is accumulating that interpersonal racial discrimination is criminogenic and ethnic-racial socialization (ERS) practices provide resilience. This research, however, has largely focused on black males. We address this gap by exploring these risk and resilience processes among black females. Drawing on Simons and Burt’s social schematic theory and research on adaptive cultural practices in African American families, this study investigates how interpersonal racial discrimination increases the risks of crime among females and whether familial ERS provides resilience. After focusing on females, we also compare the findings among females to those for males to shed light on gender differences. We examine these questions using panel data from the Family and Community Health Study, a survey of black families first surveyed in 1999 and at roughly two-year intervals thereafter. Consistent with prior work, we find a strong effect of racial discrimination on an increase in crime, with the bulk of this effect being mediated by the criminogenic knowledge structure. Although one of the two forms of ERS examined—cultural socialization—did not reduce the criminogenic effects of racial discrimination, preparation for bias exerted a strong protective effect. Comparing the findings to that for males revealed that preparation for bias attenuated the criminogenic effects of racial discrimination for both males and females, but it did so in gendered ways. This study fills a gap in our understanding of the criminogenic effects of discrimination among black females, supporting a social schematic theory’s explanation of the effects of racial discrimination on crime. In addition, findings highlight protective cultural practices in African American families, especially preparation for bias.     

They Persist: Parent and Youth Voice in the Age of Trump

In recent decades, parents and youth involved in the child welfare and foster care systems have created myriad ways to have their voices heard and their concerns appreciated, including through collective self‐advocacy efforts. New forms of individual and communal advocacy have emerged, including with supportive professionals, that acknowledge the centrality of parents and youth in every decision being made about their lives and about the systems that control their lives. Nevertheless, studies of youth and parent engagement identify the numerous individual and systemic barriers to meaningful participation and self‐advocacy efforts and the challenges to overcoming those barriers. This essay explores how empowered parents and youth can surmount those barriers with the assistance of their professional allies. Ultimately, this individual and communal engagement will strengthen a family‐oriented child welfare system and a more responsive government in these uncertain times.     

Questions Every Judge and Lawyer Should Ask About Infants and Toddlers in the Child Welfare System

We need to change the culture in our courts. Instead of ignoring the special needs of babies and toddlers, we need to recognize that abused and neglected children are at risk for developing negative sequelae as a result of their maltreatment. The science of early development is unequivocal that early intervention can be effective. The following questions were developed as a guide for lawyers, judges, and child advocates in the child welfare system as a first step toward advocacy and intervention for young children. Armed with the questions, the scientific reasons they need to be asked, and the research that provides support, we recommend that these questions be used as a tool and be asked over and over until the needs of maltreated infants and babies are addressed. It is our legal obligation under the Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997, and it is our moral responsibility to these young children.     

Employment Discrimination Law and Industrial Psychology: Social Science as Social Authority and the Co‐Production of Law and Science

This article combines Monahan and Walker's classification of social facts, social authority, and social frameworks with political‐institutionalism's view of law and science as competing institutional logics to explain how, and with what consequences, employment discrimination law and industrial‐organizational (I‐O) psychology became co‐produced. When social science is incorporated into enforcement of legislative law as social authority—rationale for judicial rule making—law's institutional logic of relying on precedent and reasoning by analogy ensures that social science will have ongoing influence on law's development. By helping set research agendas and providing new professional opportunities, institutionalized legal doctrine shapes social science knowledge. But because of differences in institutional logic, wherein legal cumulation is backward looking whereas scientific cumulation is forward looking, co‐production of law and science may produce institutional mismatch between legal doctrine and scientific knowledge.     

Taking Sides? Issues of Bias and Partisanship When Researching Socio-political Conflict

The article unpacks the issues of bias and partisanship—and the risk of being accused of these—which confront social scientists who study socio-political conflict. Drawing on the author’s experience when conducting research on the conflict between animal liberation activists and their state and corporate adversaries in Britain (1999–2014), the article argues for a relational research approach—focusing on the interaction between contending parties, rather than study stakeholders singly—as a way to overcome challenges of taking sides when studying socio-political conflict. The debate generated by Howard Becker’s classic essay “Whose side are we on?” (1967), now 50 years old, is used throughout the article as a point of reference for addressing the issues involved. The argument is made for constant reflexivity during research on radical social movements, and for “temporary bias” during qualitative fieldwork.     

Advocacy 20 years on from Hampel: is it time we revisited the postgraduate teaching of advocacy?

This paper seeks to discuss the teaching of advocacy as a discipline with specific reference to the way in which advocacy is taught on the Bar Professional Training Course in England and Wales. The Advocacy Training Council favours the Hampel Method of teaching advocacy first developed more than 20 years ago in Australia. The paper seeks to review the use of the Hampel Method by offering a critique of behaviourist learning theory from a constructivist standpoint and putting forward alternative teaching techniques which are in harmony with the principles of constructivism, experiential learning and productive failure. We conclude that the teaching of advocacy can be improved and that greater scholarship is needed in this important area to ensure students are taught using the best techniques.     

INTRODUCING PERSPECTIVES IN FAMILY LAW AND SOCIAL SCIENCE RESEARCH

This article provides an editorial introduction to the following three related articles on the growing use and influence of social science research in family law. It first considers why this has become problematic and identifies some common strategies used by advocates, sometimes under the guise of scholarship, to destroy the standing of research findings contrary to their ideological or political position. Then it discusses briefly the remedies proposed to mitigate these kinds of problems within the following three articles.     

Just Evidence: The Limits of Science in the Legal Process

Both opponents and proponents of the death penalty express faith in science and in DNA evidence to justify their positions. This article examines the production of forensic evidence as a social activity and suggests that tendencies toward bias and error may not apply symmetrically in inculpation and exoneration contexts.     

Social Movements and the Politics of Bureaucratic Rights Enforcement: Insights from the Allocation of Disability Rights in France

While research on legal mobilization shows how social movements contribute to the definition and implementation of rights, it remains excessively centered on litigation to the detriment of administrative rights enforcement. This article maps out how street‐level bureaucracies impact rights enforcement by distinguishing between allocation, access, and process, and analyzes how social movements intervene in these three aspects. It then focuses on allocation, using the case of French disability policy to analyze the forms of advocacy deployed by movement actors who take part in the rights allocation process at the local level. The article argues that conformity to institutional norms derives not so much from a pressure to conform as from the knowledge and experience of the limited means locally available to make rights effective. Further, it shows how advocacy is reframed from the defense of individual claims to a role of scrutiny and control of the bureaucratic allocation of rights.     

对犯罪心理学研究取向的思考

犯罪心理学的研究 ,需要明确它的学科性质是偏向于社会科学的中间科学和带有浓厚人文色彩的边缘科学。因此 ,在研究方法上 ,不能拘泥于自然科学式的实验室实验研究的方法 ,而应更多地采用社会科学的以社会为背景的实践检验方法 ;既要注意到人的生物性方面 ,更要侧重研究人的社会性方面 ,在此基础上 ,提出犯罪心理学的研究原则、研究方法和具体的研究方向问题。     

HIV treatments, vaccines, and microbicides: toward coordinated advocacy

In November 2003, the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network convened a meeting in Montréal of global experts working in the fields of treatments, vaccines, and microbicides. The meeting was historic in that it was the first occasion on which advocates from the three fields had the opportunity to meet and exchange views on policy priorities. In this article, John Godwin provides a summary of the background paper produced for that meeting and of the key outcomes of the meeting. The article describes the reasons why developing a joint advocacy agenda has emerged as a priority for advocacy organizations from the three fields, despite their differing histories and the fact that they have often been positioned as competitors rather than collaborators. The role of a human rights approach in informing joint advocacy and the relevance of the prevention-care-treatment continuum are considered. The article then examines possible areas for joint advocacy, including funding, clinical trials, public private partnerships, tax credits, liability issues, equity pricing, bulk procurement, regulatory issues, manufacture, delivery, and national plans. The article concludes by noting upcoming opportunities for joint advocacy efforts, and outlining the next steps to be taken by the Legal Network to support coordinated advocacy.