Hugo Munsterberg's Psychology and Law: A Historical and Contemporary Assessment

The German-American psychologist Hugo Münsterberg is widely regarded as a founder of the modern field of psychology and law. A public and controversial figure, Münsterberg's now century-old ideas and research approaches nevertheless continue to thrive. Indeed, contemporary law-psychology still grapples with many of the issues raised by Münsterberg in his seminal 1908 book, On the Witness Stand.

Hugo Münsterberg's Psychology and Law: A Historical and Contemporary Assessment makes Münsterberg's enduring insights available to a new generation of scholars and students and presents the "state of the science" on the very concepts that Münsterberg was one of the first to investigate. These include eyewitness memory, deception detection, false confessions, suggestibility, hypnotism, and the causes of criminal behavior. Opening with a brief biography of Münsterberg and a historical overview of the field, the book's organization closely follows that of On the Witness Stand, with each chapter providing a summary of Münsterberg's work followed by a contemporary perspective on the topic. Each chapter asks the reader to consider what we have learned since Münsterberg's time and whether subsequent research has shown him to be right or wrong. The final chapter asks what Münsterberg may have missed, and what we may be missing today. Hugo Münsterberg's Psychology and Law will be of interest to a broad range of scholars, practitioners, and professionals in the legal and mental health fields.