Empirical Legal Studies (YR)

Legal practice and research increasingly involve analysis of big data to resolve legal questions, and the importance of quantitative analysis is likely to continue growing in the coming years. Many legal employers may value lawyers who have at least basic familiarity with empirical research methods. During the fall semester, the course will introduce students to empirical methods and ask them to design an empirical legal study that contributes to an area of law. Among other things, students will learn to: (1) conduct a statistical analysis to produce descriptive and summary statistics on an empirical legal topic; (2) calculate correlation statistics in statistical analysis software, using different modeling techniques; (3) develop and execute an empirical strategy to make causal inferences about an empirical legal topic; (4) evaluate the quality of empirical legal research; and (5) identify an interesting empirical legal research question, research the relevant scholarship, and draft a plausible research design to explore that question. During the spring semester, students will focus on completing their study and writing their research paper. At the end of spring semester, students will present their paper at a workshop open to all UVA law faculty and students. The instructors suspect that some students might eventually submit their papers for publication, perhaps with advice and/or collaboration with a faculty member.