Psychiatrists and Psychologists Are Not Reliable Expert Witnesses

As seen in this paper

(Abstract) Psychologists and psychiatrists serving as expert witnesses in court: what do they know about eyewitness memory?

(Melindera, Annika & Magnussena, Svein. Psychology, Crime and Law. Volume 21, Issue 1, 2015. DOI: 10.1080/1068316X.2014.915324)

Abstract Expert witnesses have various tasks that frequently include issues of memory. We tested if expert witnesses outperform other practitioners on memory issues of high relevance to clinical practice. We surveyed psychiatrists and psychologists who reported serving as expert witnesses in court (n = 117) about their knowledge and beliefs about human memory.

The results were compared to a sample of psychiatrists and psychologists who had never served as expert witnesses (n = 819).

Contrary to our expectations, the professionals serving as expert witnesses did not outperform the practitioners who never served. A substantial minority of the respondents harbored scientifically unproven ideas of human memory on issues such as the memory of small children, repression of adult traumatic memories, and recovered traumatic childhood memories.

We conclude that the expert witnesses are at risk of offering bad recommendations to the court in trials where reliability of eyewitness memory is at stake.

And as seen on the Mad in America Website

Psychiatrists and psychologists who work as expert witnesses for the courts are generally no more scientifically knowledgeable or accurate about issues that involve human memory than regular practitioners or lay persons, according to a study published in Psychology, Crime and Law. In some court cases, wrote the authors of the study, the results could be “catastrophic”.

The study was based on a questionnaire distributed to members of the Norwegian Psychological and Psychiatric Associations, to which about 940 professionals responded. The surveys asked questions about current scientific understandings with respect to psychological topics often relevant to court cases, especially involving factors that affect memories in victims or eyewitnesses.

“The results of the present paper show that psychologists and psychiatrists serving as expert witnesses in court have limited knowledge about factors affecting the memory of eye witnesses and memory factors in general, and they do not score above the level of psychologists/psychiatrists in general,” wrote the authors. “Moreover, a comparison with the results of samples of lay persons and judicial professional shows that they do not outperform these samples on items common to the two surveys.”

They described the overall performance of those professionals who said they’d served as expert court witnesses as “not very impressive.” At the same time, these professionals rarely indicated that they were “uncertain” about their responses.