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The problem of evasive testimony: the expert "waffle"
1Department of Psychiatry, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Harvard Medical School, Bosston, MA, USA. gutheiltg@cs.com
Abstract:
Confronted with a difficult, unexpected, or confrontational question, an expert witness may answer by attempting to overwhelm the questioner with words, sometimes highly evasive ones, that avoid, rather than actually address, the question asked. Such a discursive response is sometimes called a "waffle," as in "The expert's answer was a waffle." This review notes some examples of this phenomenon and attempts to categorize them in a meaningful way. An ancillary goal of this discussion may be to aid experts in focusing their answers.
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