To Dollars from Sense: Qualitative to Quantitative Translation in Jury Damage Awards

Abstract:     
This article offers a new multi-stage account of jury damage award decision making. Drawing on psychological and economic research on judgment, decision making, and numeracy, the model posits that jurors first make a categorical gist judgment that money damages are warranted, and then make an ordinal gist judgment ranking the damages deserved as low, medium, or high. They then construct numbers that fit the gist of the appropriate magnitude. The article employs data from jury decision making research to explore the plausibility of the model.

Number of Pages in PDF File: 42

Keywords: juror, jury, damage awards, compensatory damages, punitive damages, decision making

working papers series