Convenient and Inconvenient Truths in Family Law: Preventing Scholar‐Advocacy Bias in the Use of Social Science Research for Public Policy

• Author: JoAnne L. Pedro‐Carroll,Robert E. Emery,Michael Saini,Irwin Sandler,Marsha Kline Pruett,Janet R. Johnston,Amy Holtzworth‐Munroe
• Date: 01 April 2016
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/fcre.12211
• Published date: 01 April 2016

CONVENIENT AND INCONVENIENT TRUTHS IN FAMILY LAW:

PREVENTING SCHOLAR-ADVOCACY BIAS IN THE USE OF SOCIAL

SCIENCE RESEARCH FOR PUBLIC POLICY

Irwin Sandler, Michael Saini, Marsha Kline Pruett, JoAnne L. Pedro-Carroll, Janet R. Johnston,

Amy Holtzworth-Munroe, and Robert E. Emery

This is the second of two articles on the risks of advocacy bias in the reporting of research findings when boundaries are

blurred between social science research and advocacy in the pursuit of public policy. In the first article we identify common

ways in which social science researchers and reviewers of research—wittingly or unwittingly—can become advocates for ideo-

logical positions and social policies at the expense of being balanced reporters of research evidence. The first article discusses

the difference between truth in social science and truth in law and identifies a range of scholar-advocacy strategies that bias

research evidence, illustrated by recent debates about overnight parenting of infants and toddlers. In this second article we

show how biased research evidence by scholar advocates results in increased confusion and controversy that diminishes the

credibility of all parties and stalemates progress in the field, using a case illustration of intimate partner violence in family

court. We also show how adherence to scientific methods prevents the misuse of research and suggest a number of collabora-

tive, integrative measures that can help transcend the adversarial stalemate. In a look to the future we consider some unbiased,

standardized ways of assessing the strength and generalizability of research evidence.

Key Points for the Family Court Community:

Scholar-advocacy bias, the intentional or unintentional use of social science research to legitimize advocacy claims, is

a problem that practitioners and policy makers must recognize and guard against in family law.

Because of different methods of pursuing and establishing truth in science and the law, ironically, the less rhetorically

convincing argument often represents science most faithfully.

Practitioners—and scientists—must guard against using various rhetorical tactics that bend research evidence, for

example, the rules of science dictate that we must prove our hypotheses; others need not disprove them.

Keywords: Advocacy Research; Scholar-Advocacy Bias; and Social Science Research.

WHAT MAKES RESEARCH VULNERABLE TO SCHOLAR-ADVOCACY BIAS

The press to distort and misuse social science data in the service of advocacy goals derives, in

part, from the highly political and personally salient nature of the substantive issues raised in the

field. Family law matters constitute an emotional and ideological cauldron where the most private

and personal conflicts within marriage and family are seething, and where public and political strug-

gles take place over access to children and disposition of family resources after parental separation,

fueling the gender wars and pitting parent against parent. They also shape policy agendas of powerful

interest groups who are mobilizing resources toward competing goals. Despite efforts to make con-

temporary family courts more collaborative, family law matters remain situated in legal institutions

that are historically and traditionally adversarial.

Correspondence: holtzwor@indiana.edu, mpruett@smith.edu, johnston527@sbcglobal.net, michael.saini@utoronto.ca,

jpcarroll4peace@gmail.com

*All authors contributed equally to this work.

FAMILY COURT REVIEW, Vol. 54 No. 2, April 2016 150–166

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C2016 Association of Family and Conciliation Courts

In this highly political, adversarial context, advocacy for particular viewpoints is the norm. It

should be no surprise that when social science knowledge is brought into the family law arena to

shed light on what to do about a problem, there is steadfast pressure to tailor research findings into

more “convenient truths” favorable to one or another stakeholder and to find a way of avoiding or

discrediting those that are “inconvenient truths.”

2

When this happens, confusion and controversy pre-

vail as to the state of the research evidence, and the credibility of all parties, including researchers, is

cast into doubt. Consequently, family courts are inconsistent or confused about how to decide trou-

bling matters, injecting more uncertainty into litigated outcomes. To varying extents, this has been

the fate of public discourse that has taken place within family courts and policy-making forums over

issues such as intimate partner violence (IPV) and child abuse, shared parenting and overnight access

schedules for young children, parental alienation and the rights of children, parental abduction and

relocation, father involvement and child support enforcement, to name a few.

A number of authors have drawn attention to the misuse of evidence for advocacy purposes, and

reciprocal accusations of misuse have been leveled (Baker, 2013; Cashmore & Parkinson, 2014;

Gelles, 1980, 2007; Johnston, 2007; Kelly & Ramsey, 2007, 2009; McIntosh, 2015; Neilsen, 2014;

Pruett, 2007; Ramsey & Kelly, 2004, 2006; Warshak, 2014). To date, opinion varies as to what con-

stitutes scholar-advocacy bias. How to identify it and the conditions that promote its use are also

largely unspecified.

3

We have defined “scholar-advocacy bias” as “the intentional or unintentional

use of the language, methods and approaches of social science research and scholarship, in addition

to one’s status as a researcher, scholar, or academic within the broader community, with the outcome

of legitimizing advocacy claims at the cost of misrepresenting research findings”(Emery et al.,

2016).

LIMITED EMPIRICAL EVIDENCE AND THE RISE OF SCHOLAR-ADVOCACY

The role of research has gained increasing traction in influencing policy. Widespread demands for

demonstrable outcomes across all fields of public policy have grown into the “evidence-based

practice” (EBP)

4

movement with the aim of bringing clinical wisdom and science closer together in a

mutually beneficial way. The overarching approach of EBP is appealing on a number of different lev-

els, not the least of which is the anticipated benefits to children and families. However, a major limi-

tation on the use of research to shape policy and practice in the family law field is the paucity of

research evidence that is sufficiently replicated and based on valid methodology to have clear and

unambiguous implications for practice and policy on many critical questions facing the field.

5

Social policies have always been the business of the collective community, albeit differentially

influenced by those with power and status, and are products of history, cultures, community values,

as well as political, ideological, and religious persuasions. As science has achieved a more authorita-

tive status, influencing how society thinks about and tries to solve some of its thorniest social dilem-

mas, the social scientists’ voice in policy debates has been given increasing weight as producers and

explainers of the evidence. Advocates on both sides of an issue value researchers as potential allies,

who are perceived to provide them with more objective evidence in support of their cause. Recipro-

cally, researchers understand that advocates have experience in shaping policy, and may be an effec-

tive force for translating findings from their research into action. Successful advocacy involves

multiple factors beyond the translation of empirical research findings into action, including attending

to the morality, ethics, related laws and legal procedures, civil rights, social values and mores, feasi-

bility, and economic costs of action proposals - all in comparison with that of existing or competing

social policies. Good public policy derives from the input of all stakeholder interests.

The basic goals and methods of researchers and advocates are, however, at odds with one another.

Insofar as possible, social science reviews of the evidence are expected to be comprehensive and rel-

evant; research reports should be systematic, transparent, and accurate, and evaluation of the evi-

dence, objective, self-critical and balanced. By contrast, in the interests of the party they represent, the

advocates’ goal is to mobilize resources towards some end in the most strategic, efficient and effective

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