Biographical Sketch

Edie Greene is Professor of Psychology at the University of Colorado-Colorado Springs (UCCS), Director of the Graduate Concentration in Psychology and Law, and Director of the Psychology Honors Program. She received a BA in psychology from Stanford University, an MA in experimental psychology from the University of Colorado-Boulder, and a Ph.D. in psychology and law from the University of Washington. She has served as Fellow in Law and Psychology at Harvard Law School, faculty member of the National Judicial College, and Visiting Scholar at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, City University of New York.

The co-author of a leading textbook in psychology and law (Psychology and the Legal System, 8th edition, published by Thomson/Wadsworth), Professor Greene teaches a survey course and an advanced undergraduate seminar in psychology and law, as well as a graduate course in psychology and law. She also teaches social psychology and honors program seminars. In 2008, she received the Outstanding Teaching and Mentoring Award from the American Psychology-Law Society.

Dr. Greene’s research focuses generally on the application of cognitive and social psychology to legal issues, and specifically on the behavior of various decision makers including juries, judges, attorneys, and witnesses. Among the topics she has studied: jurors’ comprehension and use of jury instructions, liability determinations, assessments of damage awards, judgments in death penalty cases, and use of expert testimony. She also does research on psychological aspects of aging and elder law, including elder physical and financial abuse, comprehension of legal language by older adults, and decision making in guardianship cases. She has written about the factors that influence the reliability of eyewitnesses to accidents and crimes. Recent research focuses on laypeople’s beliefs about the causes and consequences of crime and about legal blame.

Professor Greene’s research has been funded by the National Science Foundation, American Bar Association, National Institute of Justice, American Psychology-Law Society, Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues, Borchard Foundation Center on Law and Aging, and University of Colorado Committee on Research and Creative Works. She has received both college-wide and campus-wide awards for excellence in research.

Recipient of the 2009 Chancellor’s Award for Distinguished Faculty, Professor Greene is a past-president of the American Psychology-Law Society, Division 41 of the American Psychological Association (APA). She is a Fellow of the APA and the Association for Psychological Science (APS) and serves on the editorial board of Law and Human Behavior and Advances in Psychology and Law. She presents lectures on psychological aspects of the legal system to judges and attorneys, consults with attorneys on issues related to eyewitness memory and jury decision making, and has served as expert witness in state, federal, and military courts. In 2017, she will have a visiting position in the Psychology Department at Victoria University of Wellington in Wellington, New Zealand.