Enhancements    

  • Center for Law and Human Behavior

 
     500 W. University  Prospect Hall, 226  El Paso, Texas 79968
 
Homeclhb@utep.edu
 
Phone Logo(915)747-5920
 
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NETWORKS

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Mission and Goals

The Center for Law and Human Behavior has as its mission, to empirically investigate human behavior in legal and security contexts. It does so by facilitating interdisciplinary research in the area of law and social science. The Center aims to promote and facilitate the interdisciplinary and collaborative training of students through various initiatives supporting their involvement in the Center’s research. It promotes collaboration among the University, practitioners and policy makers.

Funders and Collaborators

The CLHB currently has active extramurally funded research support from:

  • the HIG/FBI (High Interest Detainee Interrogation Group/Federal Bureau of Investigation)
  • National Science Foundation
  • Two additional proposals are currently under review:The National Institute of Justice and The National Science Foundation

KEYWORDS

  1. Detection of Deception
  2. Deviance
  3. Gender and Crime
  4. Immigration and Crime
  5. Interviewing and Interrogation
  6. Legal Decision Making
  7. Psychopathic thinking

UTEP STRATEGIC AREAS

  1. Cross-cutting: U.S. –Mexico and Latin America: Social and Behavioral Issues
  2. National Defense & Border Security

IN THE NEWS

  1. UTEP Welcomes New Center for Law and Human Behavior
  2. Symposium Shares Strategies to Support Interdisciplinary Research
  3. Study Focuses on Officer-Citizen Interactions

EXPERTISE

Development of Evidence-Based Intelligence, interviewing, and Interrogation. Detection of Deception, Language use and the impact of interpretation, Immigration and its impact on Crime.

CAPABILITIES

Empirical Research: Surveys, Experiments, Quasi-Experiments, Collaborative grant and contract proposal preparation. Lectures, testimony regarding research results and implications thereof. Continuing Legal Education and Training: Judges, Lawyers, Understanding and interpreting social/behavioral science research, Basic statistics for the bar. Training for expert witnesses (for scientists and Engineers), Preparing and conducting expert testimony.

KEYWORDS

  1. Detection of Deception
  2. Deviance
  3. Gender and Crime
  4. Immigration and Crime
  5. Interviewing and Interrogation
  6. Legal Decision Making
  7. Psychopathic thinking

UTEP STRATEGIC AREAS

  1. Cross-cutting: U.S. –Mexico and Latin America: Social and Behavioral Issues
  2. National Defense & Border Security

IN THE NEWS

  1. UTEP Welcomes New Center for Law and Human Behavior
  2. Symposium Shares Strategies to Support Interdisciplinary Research
  3. Study Focuses on Officer-Citizen Interactions

MEMBERS

Alarid, Leanne
Fellow
Professor
Liberal Arts - Criminal Justice

Crites, Steve
Fellow
Professor
Liberal Arts - Psychology

Curry, Theodore
Fellow
Associate Professor
Liberal Arts - Criminal Justice

Curry, Todd
Fellow
Associate Professor
Liberal Arts - Political Science

Eno Louden, Jennifer
Fellow
Associate Professor
Liberal Arts - Psychology

Genna, Gaspare
Fellow
Professor
Liberal Arts - Political Science

Morales, Cristina
Fellow
Professor
Liberal Arts - Sociology and Anthropology

Posthuma, Richard
Fellow
Professor
Business Administration - Marketing and Management

Zavala, Egbert
Fellow
Associate Professor
Liberal Arts - Criminal Justice

KEYWORDS

  1. Detection of Deception
  2. Deviance
  3. Gender and Crime
  4. Immigration and Crime
  5. Interviewing and Interrogation
  6. Legal Decision Making
  7. Psychopathic thinking

UTEP STRATEGIC AREAS

  1. Cross-cutting: U.S. –Mexico and Latin America: Social and Behavioral Issues
  2. National Defense & Border Security

Gallery

One of the goals of the CLHB is to expand knowledge, particularly for students who may be contemplating or training for careers working at the frontiers at the interface between law and the social and behavioral sciences. A mechanism by which we do that is to provide advanced instruction on sophisticated software (such as Mplus) that will be useful to them in statistically analyzing data.

UTEP graduate students learn about Mplus at a workshop conducted under the auspices of the CLHB

Immigrants are much less likely to be involved in crime than are people who have been in the US for a generation or more. Professors Ted Curry, Cristina Morales, and Harmon M. Hosch lead an NSF supported team surveying randomly selected volunteer respondents to assess their perceptions of their neighborhoods, their relations with of the various policing agencies, and their attitudes and behaviors in this context. CLHB provides space and student financial assistance for this project.

NSF grant research team works on their survey protocol in the CLHB conference room

The CLHB served as host for the recent Faculty Expertise Encounter during which the latest call for proposals from the Department of Homeland Security was discussed. Faculty from across the university were invited to share their ideas as to what components of the request for proposals could be responded to by UTEP.

Associate Provost Dr. Smith describes the proposals request that will be responded to by the UTEP Homeland Security Institute