Robbennolt on Apologies

I continue to be fascinated by the apology movement.  I’m about to take a serious look at the literature on apologies/explanations and medical malpractice.  Jennifer Robbennolt (Illinois) has recently posted Apologies and Settlement Levers on SSRN.  The piece presents empirical evidence to support the natural intuition that apologies can alter one’s perception of a situation and/or offender to make settlement more likely.  The empirical results go further and suggest that both the nature of the apology and the circumstances surrounding the incident may play important roles in how an apology is understood.

–CJR