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  • 14 - Decision-Making by Forensic Mental Health Evaluators

  • from Part II - Pretrial Phase Decision-Making
  • Edited by Monica K. Miller, University of Nevada, Reno, Logan A. Yelderman, Prairie View A & M University, Texas, Matthew T. Huss, Creighton University, Omaha, Jason A. Cantone, George Mason University, Virginia
  • Book:
    The Cambridge Handbook of Psychology and Legal Decision-Making
    Published online:
    22 February 2024
    Print publication:
    29 February 2024, pp 211-224

  • Summary

    In any legal case, there is a pool of possible forensic evaluators whom a court might order, or an attorney might retain, to conduct a forensic mental health evaluation. There is a growing body of research showing that these evaluators are not interchangeable. They differ somewhat in their attitudes, personality traits, opinions about how to conduct evaluations, and thresholds for reaching conclusions. These differences, coupled with the subjectivity inherent to psycholegal questions and the pull of adversarial allegiance to retaining parties, can lead to biased decision-making. Although there is some support for specialized training as a mechanism for reducing these biases, even increased training will never eliminate the subjective clinical judgment necessary for some aspects of forensic assessment. The goal is to work toward reducing the impact of hidden biases on case outcomes, which should lead to better decisions by both evaluators and consumers of their work.