Interpretation of Statistical Evidence in Criminal Trials¶
Thompson, W. C., & Schumann, E. L. (1987). Interpretation of Statistical Evidence in Criminal Trials: The Prosecutor's Fallacy and the Defense Attorney's Fallacy. Law and Human Behavior, 11(3), 167-187.
Cited by¶
4 citations across 4 artifacts.
Each citation links to the sentence it supports in the citing article.
Primes¶
- Conditional Probability
- Medical diagnosis. \(P(\text{disease}\mid\text{symptom})\) versus \(P(\text{symptom}\mid\text{disease})\) — the direction matters enormously, and confusing them is the canonical base-rate-neglect error; likelihood ratios and post-test probabilities rest on conditioning. Legal evidence. The probative force of evidence is structurally \(P(\text{evidence}\mid\text{guilt}) / P(\text{evidence}\mid\text{innocence})\), and conflating \(P(\text{evidence}\mid\text{innocence})\) with \(P(\text{innocence}\mid\text{evidence})\) is the prosecutor's fallacy.
This sourceNames and analyzes the prosecutor's fallacy — conflating P(evidence|innocence) with P(innocence|evidence).
Supported in partVerified against the publisher's abstract
Names and studies the prosecutor's fallacy in jurors' statistical reasoning, but gives no likelihood-ratio formula and nothing on medical diagnosis.
“Experiment 2 exposed subjects to two fallacious arguments on how to interpret the statistical evidence. The majority of subjects failed to detect the error in one or both of the arguments and made judgments consistent with fallacious reasoning.”
- Medical diagnosis. \(P(\text{disease}\mid\text{symptom})\) versus \(P(\text{symptom}\mid\text{disease})\) — the direction matters enormously, and confusing them is the canonical base-rate-neglect error; likelihood ratios and post-test probabilities rest on conditioning. Legal evidence. The probative force of evidence is structurally \(P(\text{evidence}\mid\text{guilt}) / P(\text{evidence}\mid\text{innocence})\), and conflating \(P(\text{evidence}\mid\text{innocence})\) with \(P(\text{innocence}\mid\text{evidence})\) is the prosecutor's fallacy.
- False Positive Paradox
- In forensic science, DNA random-match and fingerprint statistics mislead unless anchored to the base rate of the relevant suspect pool.
This sourceCoins the 'prosecutor's fallacy' and shows random-match statistics mislead unless anchored to the base rate of the relevant suspect pool, supporting the forensic-science use.
Supported in partVerified against the publisher's abstract
The abstract backs the prosecutor's-fallacy frame — incidence-rate match evidence is misread in criminal trials — but not the DNA, fingerprint, suspect-pool base-rate or mass-surveillance specifics.
“The majority of subjects failed to detect the error in one or both of the arguments and made judgments consistent with fallacious reasoning.”
- In forensic science, DNA random-match and fingerprint statistics mislead unless anchored to the base rate of the relevant suspect pool.
Mechanisms¶
- Forensic Scenario Reconstruction
- Its failure mode is the prosecutor's fallacy — treating "this scenario fits the evidence" as "this scenario is what happened," while ignoring that rival scenarios fit the same traces just as well.
This sourceDefines the prosecutor’s fallacy as reversing the conditional probability of evidence and guilt.
- Its failure mode is the prosecutor's fallacy — treating "this scenario fits the evidence" as "this scenario is what happened," while ignoring that rival scenarios fit the same traces just as well.
- Likelihood-Ratio Attribution Report
- Its failure mode and classic misuse are the same error read two ways: the prosecutor's fallacy — treating "the evidence is a thousand times more probable if same-source" as "it is a thousand times more probable they are the source" — which conflates the likelihood with the posterior and ignores the base rate.
This sourceExplains the prosecutor’s fallacy as converting a likelihood or match probability into the posterior probability of guilt while neglecting prior odds or base rates.
- Its failure mode and classic misuse are the same error read two ways: the prosecutor's fallacy — treating "the evidence is a thousand times more probable if same-source" as "it is a thousand times more probable they are the source" — which conflates the likelihood with the posterior and ignores the base rate.
Verification¶
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