Empirical Legal Studies

Theodore Eisenberg (1947-2014)

It is with profound sadness and regret that I note the passing of a colleague, co-author, friend, and mentor, Ted Eisenberg. Cornell Law School and the entire empirical legal scholarship community lost a gracious colleague, an intellectual giant, and a true pioneer in empirical legal studies. Ted was a man of uncommon decency, whose fertile mind, generous spirit, and unadorned manner sat easily with the great force of his scholarly vision and scope. He is deeply missed.

[Obituary]

Call For Papers: Judging and Judicial Education

"The University of Missouri is issuing a call for proposals for an upcoming works-in-progress conference as well as a call for papers for a student writing competition.  Both of these calls are affiliated with a symposium that is being convened at the University of Missouri's Center for the Study of Dispute Resolution on Friday, October 10, 2014.

The symposium is entitled "Judicial Education and the Art of Judging:  From Myth to Methodology" and addresses a number of issues relating to the role of judges and the goals and methods of judicial education.  The symposium features the Honorable Duane Benton of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit as keynote speaker as well as an accomplished group of judges, academics, and judicial education experts from the United States and Canada as panelists.

The day before the symposium (Thursday, October 9, 2014), the University of Missouri will be hosting a works-in-progress conference relating to the subject matter of the symposium, broadly interpreted.  Presentation proposals should be no more than one page in length and can include analyses that are practical, theoretical or interdisciplinary in nature.  Participants can discuss judges at the state, federal or international level.  Proposals for the works-in-progress conference should be directed to Professor S.I. Strong ([email protected]) and will be accepted until May 26, 2014.  Decisions regarding accepted papers will be made in June 2014.  Prospective attendees should note that there is no funding available to assist participants with their travel expenses. 

The University of Missouri is also organizing a student writing competition in association with the symposium.  Papers will likely be due in August 2014, although precise details (such as the due date and the amount of any prize money associated with the competition) are still being finalized."

 

More information about the symposium, works-in-progress conference, and student writing competition is available at the symposium website. Those interested or with questions should contact Professor S.I. Strong ([email protected]) directly.

Interfacing Excel and Stata

In a bow to its market, the folks at Stata continue to tinker with Excel interfaces. Stata v.13 introduces a new command, putexcel, which enables Stata users to create tables in an Excel file (described here). A recent post to the Stata Blog describes a few new options, available in Stata 13.1. Specifically, Stata 13.1 includes a new option, keepcellformat. The option retains a cell’s format after writing numeric data to it. The keepcellformat option will interest people who want to automate the updating of a report or paper.

Simkovic & McIntyre's Review of Tamanaha's "Failing Law Schools"

While the complex (and heated) debate concerning law schools' future(s) will continue to unfold, Simkovic & McIntyre's recent review of Tamanaha's provocative book is noted for its empirical orientation.

A Helpful Presentation on Deciphering Interactions in Logistic Regression

Courtesy of UCLA's Statistical Consulting Group, this presentation walks folks through some potential points of confusion that can quickly complicate logistic regression results. Step-by-step illustrations assist the explanation. A brief description of the site's motivation follows.

"... But in logistic regression interaction is a more complex concept. Researchers need to decide on how to conceptualize the interaction. Is the interaction to be conceptualized in terms of log odds (logits) or odds ratios or probability? This decision can make a big difference. An interaction that is significant in log odds may not be significant in terms of difference in differences for probability. Or vice versa."