Speaker identification in courtroom contexts - Part III: Groups of collaborating listeners compared to forensic voice comparison based on automatic-speaker-recognition technology.

Expert testimony is only admissible in common-law systems if it will potentially assist the trier of fact. In order for a forensic-voice-comparison expert's testimony to assist a trier of fact, the expert's forensic voice comparison should be more accurate than the trier of fact's speaker identification. "Speaker identification in courtroom contexts - Part I" addressed the question of whether speaker identification by an individual lay listener (such as a judge) would be more or less accurate than the output of a forensic-voice-comparison system that is based on state-of-the-art automatic-speaker-recognition technology. The present paper addresses the question of whether speaker identification by a group of collaborating lay listeners (such as a jury) would be more or less accurate than the output of such a forensic-voice-comparison system. As members of collaborating groups, participants listen to pairs of recordings reflecting the conditions of the questioned- and known-speaker recordings in an actual case, confer, and make a probabilistic consensus judgement on each pair of recordings. The present paper also compares group-consensus responses with "wisdom of the crowd" which uses the average of the responses from multiple independent individual listeners.

Speaker identification in courtroom contexts - Part II: Investigation of bias in individual listeners' responses.

In "Speaker identification in courtroom contexts - Part I" individual listeners made speaker-identification judgements on pairs of recordings which reflected the conditions of the questioned-speaker and known-speaker recordings in a real case. The recording conditions were poor, and there was a mismatch between the questioned-speaker condition and the known-speaker condition. No contextual information that could potentially bias listeners' responses was included in the experiment condition - it was decontextualized with respect to case circumstances and with respect to other evidence that could be presented in the context of a case. Listeners' responses exhibited a bias in favour of the different-speaker hypothesis. It was hypothesized that the bias was due to the poor and mismatched recording conditions. The present research compares speaker-identification performance between: (1) listeners under the original Part I experiment condition, (2) listeners who were informed ahead of time that the recording conditions would make the recordings sound more different from one another than had they both been high-quality recordings, and (3) listeners who were presented with high-quality versions of the recordings. Under all experiment conditions, there was a substantial bias in favour of the different-speaker hypothesis. The bias in favour of the different-speaker hypothesis therefore appears not to be due to the poor and mismatched recording conditions.

Speaker identification in courtroom contexts - Part I: Individual listeners compared to forensic voice comparison based on automatic-speaker-recognition technology.

Expert testimony is only admissible in common law if it will potentially assist the trier of fact to make a decision that they would not be able to make unaided. The present paper addresses the question of whether speaker identification by an individual lay listener (such as a judge) would be more or less accurate than the output of a forensic-voice-comparison system that is based on state-of-the-art automatic-speaker-recognition technology. Listeners listen to and make probabilistic judgements on pairs of recordings reflecting the conditions of the questioned- and known-speaker recordings in an actual case. Reflecting different courtroom contexts, listeners with different language backgrounds are tested: Some are familiar with the language and accent spoken, some are familiar with the language but less familiar with the accent, and others are less familiar with the language. Also reflecting different courtroom contexts: In one condition listeners make judgements based only on listening, and in another condition listeners make judgements based on both listening to the recordings and considering the likelihood-ratio values output by the forensic-voice-comparison system.

Limited not lazy: a quasi-experimental secondary analysis of evidence quality evaluations by those who hold implausible beliefs.

Past research suggests that an uncritical or 'lazy' style of evaluating evidence may play a role in the development and maintenance of implausible beliefs. We examine this possibility by using a quasi-experimental design to compare how low- and high-quality evidence is evaluated by those who do and do not endorse implausible claims. Seven studies conducted during 2019-2020 provided the data for this analysis (N = 746). Each of the seven primary studies presented participants with high- and/or low-quality evidence and measured implausible claim endorsement and evaluations of evidence persuasiveness (via credibility, value, and/or weight). A linear mixed-effect model was used to predict persuasiveness from the interaction between implausible claim endorsement and evidence quality. Our results showed that endorsers were significantly more persuaded by the evidence than non-endorsers, but both groups were significantly more persuaded by high-quality than low-quality evidence. The interaction between endorsement and evidence quality was not significant. These results suggest that the formation and maintenance of implausible beliefs by endorsers may result from less critical evidence evaluations rather than a failure to analyse. This is consistent with a limited rather than a lazy approach and suggests that interventions to develop analytical skill may be useful for minimising the effects of implausible claims.

Communicating forensic science opinion: An examination of expert reporting practices.

Forensic scientists endeavour to explain complex scientific principles to legal decision-makers with limited scientific training (e.g., police, lawyers, judges, and jurors). Much of the time this communication is limited to written opinions in expert reports. Notwithstanding considerable scientific research and debate about the best way to communicate forensic science opinions, it is unclear how much of the advice has translated into forensic science practice. In conducting this descriptive study, we examined the reporting practices adopted by forensic scientists across a range of forensic science disciplines. Specifically, we used a quantitative content analysis approach to identify the conclusion types and additional information submitted by forensic scientists in proficiency tests during 2016 ("What would be the wording of the Conclusions in your report?"). Our analysis of 500 randomly selected responses in eight disciplines indicated that the conclusion type which has received the most criticism in recent years (categorical statements) remains the preferred means of expression in a clear majority of responses. We also found that the provision of additional information often considered necessary for rational evaluation of the evidence (e.g., information about reliability and validity) was rarely reported. These results suggest limited engagement with recent recommendations and are concerning given the gravity of the legal decisions that hinge on accurate and transparent forensic science communication.