Teaching Behavioral Legal Ethics: A Blog and Literature Review

As we head into a new semester, I thought it would be a good time to cull from our archives blog posts that are helpful to teaching Behavioral Legal Ethics. Here is my list, with links for those who are interested:

• Summer Fun with Illusions (and a metaphor to boot!)
• The Technological Future of Behavioral Legal Ethics?
• Ethics Unwrapped, an Invaluable Resource
• New Interactive Video on Behavioral Legal Ethics — available free for law professors!
• Teaching Behavioral Legal Ethics: A Seminar
• Published: “Insights from Psychology: Teaching Behavioral Legal Ethics as a Core Element of Professional Responsibility”
• New Scholarship: Giving Voice to Values in Legal Education
• Teaching Confidentiality . . . and Confirmation Bias
• Podcast on BLE
• Sharing Teaching Ideas
• Teaching Ferguson
• Teaching BLE: Ethical Fading
• Big Moral Issues and Everyday Compromises
• What Asch’s Line Experiment Can Teach Us about Conformity and In-House Lawyers
• Fundamental Attribution Error
• What Asch’s Line Experiment Can Teach Us about Conformity and In-House Lawyers
• Teaching Through Literature
• Teaching Partisan Bias
• Lessons from the Stanford Prison Experiment
• Cognitive Reflection Test
• Teaching about the Slippery Slope
• BLE In the Classroom, Part 1

In addition, there is growing scholarship about the pedagogy of Behavioral Legal Ethics. I have started a bibliography, broadening it to include behavioral ethics and psychology/legal education more generally. Here is my initial list (in addition, I would encourage anyone teaching BLE to be familiar with its foundational scholarship, starting with Behavioral Legal Ethics). Please let me know if there are other articles on BLE pedagogy that should be included (I can be reached at teldred@nesl.edu). Thanks!

Behavioral Legal Ethics:

• Paula Schaefer, Building on the Professionalism Foundation of Best Practices for Legal Education, 14 U. St. Thomas L.J. 320, 322 (2018)
• Vivien Holmes, ‘Giving Voice to Values’: Enhancing Students’ Capacity to Cope with Ethical Challenges in Legal Practice, 18 LEGAL ETHICS 115 (2015)
• Tigran W. Eldred, Insights from Psychology: Teaching Behavioral Legal Ethics as a Core Element of Professional Responsibility, 2016 Mich. St. L. Rev. 757 (2016)

Behavioral Ethics:

• Mark S Schwartz, Teaching Behavioral Ethics: Overcoming the Key Impediments to Ethical Behavior, 41 J. Mgmt. Educ. 497 (2017)
• Robert A. Prentice, Behavioral Ethics: Can It Help Lawyers (And Others) Be Their Best Selves?, 29 Notre Dame J.L. Ethics & Pub. Pol’y 35 (2015)
• Minette Drumwright et al., Behavioral Ethics and Teaching Ethical Decision Making, 13 Decision Sci. J. Innovative Educ. 431 (2015)
• Robert Prentice, Teaching Behavioral Ethics, 31 J. Leg. Stud. Educ. 325 (2014)
• Robert A. Prentice, Teaching Ethics, Heuristics, and Biases, 1 J. Bus. Ethics Educ. 57 (2004)

Psychology and Legal Education:

• Jean R. Sternlight & Jennifer K. Robbennolt, Psychology and Effective Lawyering: Insights for Legal Educators, 64 J. LEGAL EDUC. 365, 375-77 (2015)

 

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Scholarship Update

New article of interest: Nancy B. Rapoport & Joseph R. Tiano Jr., Legal Analytics, Social Science, and Legal Fees: Reimagining “Legal Spend” Decisions in an Evolving Industry, 35 Ga. St. U. L. Rev. (2019).

This article, co-authored by Professor Nancy Rapoport, who has written extensively about Behavioral Legal Ethics, discusses “how legal analytics can help law firms and clients understand, monitor, and improve the components that comprise bills for legal fees and expenses.” Part II of the paper surveys some of the behavioral reasons — including anchoring, social pressure and cognitive dissonance — that can influence the costs of legal services. Download it from SSRN here.

Summer Fun with Illusions (and a metaphor to boot!)

As August moves slowly toward the beginning of the school year, I find myself thinking about teaching legal ethics in the new semester.  As I discussed in my paper on the subject, when I teach Behavioral Legal Ethics I start by showing my students a few visual illusions, just to get them thinking about the limits of perception. My favorite, which I show in video form, is the Checker Board Illusion. Here it is for those not familiar with it:

As I was tinkering around with Twitter today, I came across another illusion, which is a must see. I have no idea how it works, but that it does is amazing. Here it is (and quite a metaphor for our times, I might add!):

This might be the Derek Zoolander of arrows. It can't point left. At least not until you put a mirror in front of it. Here's how it works: https://t.co/1D3nnZ2oWb pic.twitter.com/i33mawOGh0

— WIRED (@WIRED) August 3, 2019