[Music] legal psychology involves empirical psychological research of the law legal institutions and people who come into contact with the law legal psychologists typically take basic social and cognitive principles and apply them to issues in the legal system such as eyewitness memory jury decision-making investigations and interviewing the term legal psychology has only recently come into usage primarily as a way to differentiate the experimental focus of legal psychology from the clinically oriented forensic psychology together legal psychology and forensic psychology formed the field more generally recognized as psychology in law following earlier efforts by psychologists to address legal issues psychology and law became a field of study in the 1960s as part of an effort to enhance justice though that originating concern has lessened over time the multidisciplinary American Psychological associations division 41 the American psychology Law Society is active with the goal of promoting the contributions of psychology to the understanding of law and legal systems through research as well as providing education to psychologists in legal issues and providing education to legal personnel on psychological issues further its mandate is to inform the psychological and legal communities and the public at large of current research educational and service in the area of psychology and law there are similar societies in Britain and Europe