Kaempf Aimee C, Baxter Prudence, Packer Ira K, Pinals Debra A
Dr. Kaempf is Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, University of Arizona College of Medicine, Tucson, AZ. Dr. Baxter is Clinical Instructor in Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA. Dr. Packer is Clinical Professor of Psychiatry and Dr. Pinals is Associate Professor of Psychiatry, University of Massachusetts Medical School (UMMS), Worcester, MA. Drs. Baxter, Packer, and Pinals are affiliated with the UMMS Law and Psychiatry Program. This study was presented before data collection as a poster presentation, "Gender and the Experience of Providing Expert Testimony," at the 39th Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law, Seattle, WA, October 23-26, 2008.
J Am Acad Psychiatry Law. 2015 Mar;43(1):52-9.
Mental health expert witness testimony involves complex tasks, and the capacity to perform under pressure is a fundamental skill of a forensic professional. In this context, it is important to understand the nuances of the provision of expert witness testimony. There have been several efforts to examine gender bias across legal and medical systems. Despite these reviews, little is known about how men and women differ or are similar with regard to performing expert witness functions. The purpose of this pilot study was to examine whether the testimony experiences of psychiatry and psychology experts vary by gender. Differences across certain domains, such as the sense of never experiencing anxiety and the sense of one's impact on case outcome were seen across genders. Few other gender-based differences in the experience of providing expert witness testimony were seen. Although the findings of this study raise further questions, they highlight some of the important subtleties noted in forensic practice and the work of the expert witness. In future studies, researchers should continue to explore these findings on the influence of gender and expand to consider culture and race as additional factors in the experience of expert witness testimony. As forensic professional practice evolves, it is important to understand unique aspects of forensic practice, to improve training of forensic experts, and to assist forensic experts in anticipating what they may experience related to the provision of expert testimony.
心理健康专家证人的证词涉及复杂任务，在压力下执行任务的能力是法医专业人员的一项基本技能。在这种情况下，了解专家证人证词提供的细微差别很重要。已经有多项研究致力于考察法律和医疗系统中的性别偏见。尽管有这些综述，但对于男性和女性在履行专家证人职能方面的差异或相似之处，人们知之甚少。这项初步研究的目的是考察精神病学和心理学专家的证词经历是否因性别而异。在某些领域，如从未体验过焦虑的感觉以及个人对案件结果的影响感，存在性别差异。在提供专家证人证词的经历中，很少看到其他基于性别的差异。尽管这项研究的结果引发了更多问题，但它们凸显了法医实践和专家证人工作中一些重要的细微差别。在未来的研究中，研究人员应继续探讨这些关于性别影响的发现，并扩大研究范围，将文化和种族作为专家证人证词经历中的额外因素加以考虑。随着法医专业实践的发展，了解法医实践的独特方面、改进对法医专家的培训以及帮助法医专家预测他们在提供专家证词时可能遇到的情况非常重要。
