The “endowment effect” (EE) — the tendency to value an asset more when it is possessed — has been empirically studied in detail at the individual level. The prices individuals demand to sell a good they own is significantly higher than what they offer to buy it. No published study has...

The law has traditionally responded to cognitive disability by authorizing surrogate decision-makers to make decisions on behalf of disabled individuals. However, supported decision-making, an alternative paradigm for addressing cognitive disability, is rapidly gaining political support....

Scholars and policymakers from multiple disciplines have long debated whether and when paternalistic intervention might be appropriate to guide ordinary decisionmakers choices and behaviors. Recently, the use of empirical data has begun to inform this debate. Some such research has demonstrated...

Despite burgeoning as a field of study, and despite receiving substantial attention outside of academia – now – Justice Sotomayor’s “empathy” kerfuffle as the most prominent example – law and emotions has received little treatment as a unified field. A book-length treatment a decade...

States' default surrogate statutes allow family or friends to make health care decisions for incapacitated patients who lack advance directives. Although such statutes are commonly justified on the grounds that they honor the wishes of incapacitated persons, our review of empirical research on...

I briefly introduce a Special Issue on the psychological study of property law, theory, and doctrine. The Issue builds on a 2008 Panel at the annual American Psychology/Law Society Conference that brought together legal academics, psychologists, and policy-makers working at the crossroads of...

The psycholegal study of property law, theory, and doctrine is a new and developing topic area. As one Article in a Special Issue of the Tulane Law Review, this paper serves as a broad introduction and overview to the field. Aimed at both legal academics and social scientists, a primary goal is...

This is an entry from a forthcoming book, The Encyclopedia of Positive Psychology, edited by Shane J. Lopez (forthcoming). This volume has as its target audience high school and college library users in addition to consumers, primarily corporate and government professionals, who are educated but...

In the last forty years, the study of social perceptions of crime in general, and the seriousness of criminal offenses in particular, has been of substantial interest to policymakers, courts, and social scientists. As a matter of criminal justice policy, consensus about how severe a crime is can...

Social psychological research shows that some individuals (quot;entity theoristsquot;) view others as possessing fixed, unchanging moral traits; some individuals (quot;incremental theoristsquot;) see others' moral traits as malleable and dynamic. Such individual differences in implicit theories...