A very effective way of increasing the effectiveness of expert testimony is by enhancing focus, understanding, and recall by teaming the testifying expert with a qualified medical illustrator, experienced in preparing legal graphics (illustrations, animations, models, etc.). By working together, the medical knowledge and oral skills of the expert can be supported by expertly created medical graphics that greatly clarify complicated anatomical, physiological, and medical subtleties. Together they result in much more effective communication with the decision makers than if verbal testimony or the graphics were used alone (one mode of communication used alone without being supported by the other). In addition, during a period of hours or days of listening to arguments that are typically only verbal, decision makers grasp the opportunity to focus on visuals in the form of illustrations, photographs, models, and/or animations. In fact, information is generally better processed if jury members and other triers of fact can have information presented in a multimodal fashion (i.e. combinations of simultaneous auditory, visual, and tactile stimuli).

The effectiveness of visuals is supported throughout our society by such common phrases as “A picture is worth a thousand words”, and “Seeing is believing.” In addition, numerous manuscripts refer to studies substantiating that recall is greatly increased when the verbal message is supported by visual images. Typically these studies have shown that after varying periods of time information that was delivered by a combination of voice supported by visuals was recalled at a significantly higher percentage than the same message delivered by voice alone.

References

DeBoth, C. J., & Dominowski, R. L. Individual differences in learning: Visual versus
auditory presentation. Journal of Educational Psychology, 1978; Aug 70 (4): 498-503

McCall, J., & Rae, G. Relative efficiency of visual, auditory and combined modes of
presentation in learning of paired-associates. Perceptual and Motor Skills, 1974; June (38) : 955-958.

Multimodal Learning Through Media: What the Research Says. Cisco Web site. http://www.cisco.com/web/strategy/docs/education/Multimodal-Learning-Through-Media.pdf. Accessed August 19, 2008.