The Sociologist as Expert Witness: A Resource for Resolving Injustice in the Case of Personal Injury

Abstract

This article expands the application of sociology in expert testimony by presenting a case study of personal injury. Experts in this matter are drawn typically from the domains of psychology, medicine, and economics. Reframing personal injury by summoning a sociological analytical framework shifts the analysis from a determination made on the basis of an absolute standard of injury to a relative one based on “cultural injury.” Individual damages are reasoned on the basis of a situational context analogous to the part of a musician in a symphony, whereby behavior cannot be understood apart from its milieu. An extensive literature review of “Machismo” and the ethnic character of Latinos, particularly Costa Rican males, provides the background for inferring the extent of impairment resulting from an automobile collision. Implications are for applied sociologists and for the legal community concerning a reassessment of conventional procedures for assigning monetary compensation to victims injured by liable others.