Might the concept of "good judgment" vary by framing or social roles? Five studies of four nations (🇺🇸🇨🇦🇬🇧🇨🇳) found some words and roles were more associated with "rational" than "reasonable" (and vice versa). doi.org/10.1162/opmi... #CogSci #xPhi #linguistics #dataViz

(Last) Call for Papers: "New Voices in Legislation", 2026 AALS Annual Meeting in New Orleans (Jan. 7, 4pm). Junior scholars will workshop drafts in groups, led by a senior commenter. Please send drafts to [email protected] by Sep. 19, 2025 with the subject "AALS New Voices Submission."

The fabulous @jrabanos.bsky.social and @BojanSpaic discussed experimental jurisprudence with me in their awesome podcast! If you want to know why experimental jurisprudence is not like theoretical physics, or what does lying and reasonableness have in common, check it out!

(Last) Call for Papers: "New Voices in Legislation", 2026 AALS Annual Meeting in New Orleans (Jan. 7, 4pm). Junior scholars will workshop drafts in groups, led by a senior commenter. Please send drafts to [email protected] by Sep. 19, 2025 with the subject "AALS New Voices Submission."

Final call for global collaborators on this replication collaboration on @bioxphi studies — moral psychologists and x-phi researchers wanted! especially based in SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE! global-bioXphi | moral science lab www.mscilab.com/globalbioxphi/

The final version of my "Corruption and the Supreme Court" has been published in the Yale Journal of Law & the Humanities, and is available for download here: ssrn.com/abstract=497...

After many years of anticipation (mainly by me), @drlarisa.bsky.social and I have a paper on the way people understand two mental state terms used in the criminal law -- "knowingly" and "recklessly" -- forthcoming in JEP:Applied. 1/

I am delighted to share our new #PNAS paper, with @grvkamath.bsky.social @msonderegger.bsky.social and @sivareddyg.bsky.social, on whether age matters for the adoption of new meanings. That is, as words change meaning, does the rate of adoption vary across generations? www.pnas.org/doi/epdf/10....

Last fall, the editors of the Harvard Law Review invited me to write the Foreword for this year's Supreme Court issue. My working draft is below, and comments are most welcome. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

Must read. This is criminal conduct, full stop.

Do not look away.

I just posted a new paper on @ssrn.bsky.social, titled "The Chadha Presidency". Here's the link, and I'll post the abstract in the next post. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

There’s so much interesting data in this latest by @adambonica.bsky.social on data and democracy. Highlights (or lowlights) to me include Supreme Court acting virtually opposite the lower courts, the U.S. being the biggest gerontocracy & low Dem turnout in 2024. open.substack.com/pub/data4dem...

Currently accepting applications on a rolling basis! Postdoc in Empirical Approaches to Legal Interpretation, with a start date of Fall 2025. A great opportunity to work with the wonderful @complingy.bsky.social @kevintobia.bsky.social Details here: apply.interfolio.com/170055

What I Heard on a Suicide Hotline for Trans Kids "That more calls came from rural red than from urban blue states was not a mere gut feeling...Published data by the Trevor Project links the dozens of recent anti-trans laws w/ increases in the rates of suicide attempts by trans & nonbinary youth"

Two more overnight wins: my team successfully removed a scheme from the Republican bill to end background checks and registrations for easily-concealed guns and silencers. There’s no limit to the awful stuff they crammed into this bill.

Imagine a friend experienced a dramatic deterioration, becoming cruel and selfish. You might say this is not even the "same person." But studies find that when judging dramatic improvements, people more often say the person is still the same. A new paper finds this same asymmetry across cultures!