Minds on Trial


Book Description

Minds on Trial: Great Cases in Law and Psychology gives you an inside view of 20 of the highest profile legal cases of the last 50 years. The authors skillfully convey the psychological and legal drama of each case, while providing important and fresh professional insights. Mental health and legal professionals, as well as others with an interest in psychology and the law will have a hard time putting this scholarly, yet readable book down.




The Mad, the Bad, and the Innocent


Book Description

Into the heart of a killer The Mad Over the past twenty years, renowned forensic psychologist Barbara Kirwin has confronted a terrifying lineup of murderers, rapists, paranoids, and psychopaths--including notorious serial killer Joel Rifkin--to distinguish the truly mad from the bad trying to cop an insanity plea. The Bad Here, in chilling detail, she recalls her most grisly cases and offers riveting psychological portraits of other infamous killers, including "Son of Sam" David Berkowitz, Colin Ferguson, Ted Bundy, Jeffrey Dahmer, the Menendez brothers, Susan Smith, and John W. Hinckley, Jr. The Innocent Moving from prison holding cells to sensational courtroom trails, Kirwin tells the truth about the insanity defense and its abuse by criminal lawyers conjuring up outrageous defenses--from adopted child syndrome to postpartum psychosis to sleepwalking. As she pries open the criminal mind, Kirwin takes us on a riveting journey into the heart of darkness, where madness and evil thrive.




Minds, Brains, and Law


Book Description

This book addresses the philosophical questions that arise when neuroscientific research and technology are applied in the legal system. The empirical, practical, ethical, and conceptual issues that Pardo and Patterson seek to redress will deeply influence how we negotiate and implement the fruits of neuroscience in law and policy in the future.




Changing Minds


Book Description

Think about the last time you tried to change someone’s mind about something important: a voter’s political beliefs; a customer’s favorite brand; a spouse’s decorating taste. Chances are you weren’t successful in shifting that person’s beliefs in any way. In his book, Changing Minds, Harvard psychologist Howard Gardner explains what happens during the course of changing a mind – and offers ways to influence that process. Remember that we don’t change our minds overnight, it happens in gradual stages that can be powerfully influenced along the way. This book provides insights that can broaden our horizons and shape our lives.




Forensic and Legal Psychology


Book Description

Using research in clinical, cognitive, developmental, and social psychology, Forensic and Legal Psychology shows how psychological science can enhance the gathering and presentation of evidence, improve legal decision-making, prevent crime, rehabilitate criminals, and promote justice. Although the emphasis is on psychological research, the textbook makes extensive use of actual cases and real trials to engage students and to illustrate the relevance of research findings. Written in a clear, student-friendly style, Forensic and Legal Psychology is designed for both the psychology and law AND forensic psychology class. Visit the preview site for more information: www.worthpublishers.com/costanzokrausspreview




Rap on Trial


Book Description

A groundbreaking exposé about the alarming use of rap lyrics as criminal evidence to convict and incarcerate young men of color Should Johnny Cash have been charged with murder after he sang, "I shot a man in Reno just to watch him die"? Few would seriously subscribe to this notion of justice. Yet in 2001, a rapper named Mac whose music had gained national recognition was convicted of manslaughter after the prosecutor quoted liberally from his album Shell Shocked. Mac was sentenced to thirty years in prison, where he remains. And his case is just one of many nationwide. Over the last three decades, as rap became increasingly popular, prosecutors saw an opportunity: they could present the sometimes violent, crime-laden lyrics of amateur rappers as confessions to crimes, threats of violence, evidence of gang affiliation, or revelations of criminal motive—and judges and juries would go along with it. Detectives have reopened cold cases on account of rap lyrics and videos alone, and prosecutors have secured convictions by presenting such lyrics and videos of rappers as autobiography. Now, an alarming number of aspiring rappers are imprisoned. No other form of creative expression is treated this way in the courts. Rap on Trial places this disturbing practice in the context of hip hop history and exposes what's at stake. It's a gripping, timely exploration at the crossroads of contemporary hip hop and mass incarceration.




Minds on Trial


Book Description

In recent years, the public has become increasingly fascinated with the criminal mind. Television series centered on courtroom trials, criminal investigations, and forensic psychology are more popular than ever. More and more people are interested in the American system of justice and the individuals who experience it firsthand. Minds on Trial: Great Cases in Law and Psychology gives you an inside view of 20 of the highest profile legal cases of the last 50 years. Drs. Ewing and McCann take you "behind the scenes" of each of these cases, some involving celebrities like Woody Allen, Mike Tyson, and Patty Hearst, and explain the impact they had on the fields of psychology and the law. Many of the cases in this book, whether involving a celebrity client or an ordinary person in an extraordinary circumstance, were determined in part by the expert testimony of a psychologist or other mental health professional. Psychology has always played a vital role in so many aspects of the American legal system, and these fascinating trials offer insight into many intriguing psychological issues. In addition to expert testimony, some of the issues discussed in this entertaining and educational book include the insanity defense, brainwashing, criminal profiling, capital punishment, child custody, juvenile delinquency, and false confessions. In Minds on Trial, the authors skillfully convey the psychological and legal drama of each case, while providing important and fresh professional insights. Mental health and legal professionals, as well as others with an interest in psychology and the law will have a hard time putting this scholarly, yet readable book down.




Experiencing Other Minds in the Courtroom


Book Description

Increasingly in America s courtrooms lawyers, litigants, and expert witnesses attempt to recreate what it s like to be inside the litigant s mind. But is it really possible to claim this perception as evidence? Is seeing really believing? Can anyone really know what it s like to have another person s perceptual experiences, when only that person has direct access to them? And why should courts ever admit visual or auditory evidence that purports to convey what another person s consciousness is like? How might these simulations affect the ways that judges and jurors do justice? Experiencing Other Minds thoughtful explores this evidentiary and cognitive terrain. Whether a simulation actually provides reliable knowledge about the other person s inner experience, depends on the strength of our grounds for believing in it. And that depends largely on how the simulation was made. Primarily a descriptive and analytic work, Experiencing Other Minds conducts a legal anthropological inquiry into a novel and distinctive evidentiary practice, situating each example of digitally simulated subjective perception in its case context and drawing on cognitive psychology, media studies, science and technology studies, and other disciplines to understand how each simulation produces specific epistemological and rhetorical effects. By paying closer attention to the different kinds of simulation and the different knowledge claims they offer, we can develop best practices for responsibly incorporating such evidence in the courtroom, and thereby improve the quality of justice as well. "




Defeating Darwinism by Opening Minds


Book Description

Phillip E. Johnson provides an easy-to-understand guide on how to effectively engage the debate over creation and evolution.




Minds on Fire


Book Description

A Choice Outstanding Academic Title of the Year In Minds on Fire, Mark C. Carnes shows how role-immersion games channel students’ competitive (and sometimes mischievous) impulses into transformative learning experiences. His discussion is based on interviews with scores of students and faculty who have used a pedagogy called Reacting to the Past, which features month-long games set during the French Revolution, Galileo’s trial, the partition of India, and dozens of other epochal moments in disciplines ranging from art history to the sciences. These games have spread to over three hundred campuses around the world, where many of their benefits defy expectations. “[Minds on Fire is] Carnes’s beautifully written apologia for this fascinating and powerful approach to teaching and learning in higher education. If we are willing to open our minds and explore student-centered approaches like Reacting [to the Past], we might just find that the spark of student engagement we have been searching for in higher education’s mythical past can catch fire in the classrooms of the present.” —James M. Lang, Chronicle of Higher Education “This book is a highly engaging and inspirational study of a ‘new’ technique that just might change the way educators bring students to learning in the 21st century.” —D. D. Bouchard, Choice