psychology_Sons_(2003)

398 Forensic Psychology

were the most popular topics. Hutchins and Slesinger (1928a,
1928b, 1928c, 1929) carried out a series of studies on the law
of evidence, looking at “consciousness of guilt,” memory,
spontaneous exclamations, and hearsay.
The first textbook in the area written by a psychologist
wasLegal Psychology by Howard Burtt (1931), also a
student of Münsterberg’s. In 1935, psychologist Edward
Robinson wrote Law and the Lawyers,in which he argued
that “every legal problem is at bottom a psychological prob-
lem and... every one of the many legal traditions about
human nature which are to be found in legal training needs
to be gone over from the standpoint of modern psychologi-
cal knowledge” (Robinson, 1935, p. 51). This controversial
book, like Münsterberg’s, was received negatively by legal
reviewers (e.g., Mechem, 1936), who asserted that psychol-
ogy did not have the necessary knowledge to provide “plain
psychological facts” (Robinson’s term) that would be useful
to the legal system. Robinson also recommended that psy-
chological researchers investigate the behavioral premises
implicit in legal doctrines. Loh (1981, p. 319) later pointed
out that “This modest and sensible proposition, embedded as
it was in his more impassioned diatribes against the conser-
vatism of the law, was lost on his legal critics.”

EMERGENCE OF FORENSIC PSYCHOLOGY
AS A RECOGNIZED SUBFIELD

Signs of Maturation

Among the early signs that a field is beginning to mature is
the emergence of professional organizations and publications
that provide a source of intellectual support for the field, the
identification of a specific knowledge domain that constitutes
the field, and the development of professional training pro-
grams. The 1970s and 1980s saw significant development in
all of these areas for forensic psychology and for psychology
and law.

Professional Organizations

The American Psychology-Law Society was chartered in
1969, and it soon became the organizational support for enor-
mous growth in psychology and law research and for forensic
psychology practitioners (Grisso, 1991). From an initial
12 founders, the organization grew to over 100 members
within its first year. Although most of its early members spe-
cialized in clinical forensic practice, during the 1970s the
focus of the organization swung primarily to research and ap-
plications of social, developmental, and experimental psy-
chology to legal issues.

When a number of members wished to develop a way to

certify clinical forensic psychologists, the society provided

the financial support for the development of a separate

organization, the American Board of Forensic Psychology, in

1976. This board developed a process of examination leading
      to a diplomate in forensic psychology, and the board eventu-
      ally became a specialty board of the American Board of
      Professional Psychology.
      Led by John Monahan, several psychologists in the soci-
      ety successfully petitioned the American Psychological As-
      sociation for a Division of Psychology and Law, which began
      in 1980. Within a few years the American Psychology-Law
      Society merged with the division, which is now formally
      named APA Division 41—the American Psychology-Law
      Society.

Journals and Textbooks

The 1970s saw the development of the first journals in

law and psychology. The American Psychology-Law Society

began publishing Law and Human Behavior, and the

American Association of Correctional Psychologists devel-

opedCriminal Justice and Behavior. They were joined by the

Law and Psychology Review,then in the 1980s by Behavioral

Sciences and the Law,and finally the APA’s new journal,

Psychology, Public Policy, and Law,in the 1990s. Several

new journals also appeared in Great Britain in the 1990s:

Criminal Behaviour and Mental Health, Legal and Crimino-

logical Psychology, andPsychology, Crime and Law.

One of the first forensic psychology texts in this modern

era of forensic psychology was Brodsky’s Psychologists in

the Criminal Justice System(1973). Few texts in psychology

and law were available until the American Psychology-Law

Society developed a book series in the mid-1970s, but by the

1980s the field had spawned enough texts to provide the field

with a body of recognized knowledge that began to forge the

field’s identity.

Basic Knowledge Domain

As the field evolved, the question of what constituted the

knowledge domain that defines forensic psychology became

more salient. This was particularly important from the per-

spective of training forensic psychologists. A National Con-

ference on Education and Training in Law and Psychology,

popularly known as the Villanova Conference, addressed this

issue in 1995. The conference participants identified five areas

crucial for properly educating a competent scholar of psy-

chology and law. The first wassubstantive psychology,a core

knowledge of basic areas of psychology (e.g., developmental,