3min chapter

PNAS Science Sessions cover image

Why legalese persists

PNAS Science Sessions

CHAPTER

Lawyers and Lay People's Comprehendance of Legalese

Study: Lawyers struggle to understand legal documents written in legalese relative to simple alternatives. Authors say this undermines what they call the curse of knowledge hypothesis as an explanation for why lawyers write in a convoluted manner. They found no evidence that lawyers were disproportionately better than lay people at reading legalese contractsrelative to simple contracts.

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