Richard L. Wiener received his Ph.D. in Psychology from the University of Houston and completed a post-doctorate at Loyola University, where he began his work at the intersection of Law and Psychology. He studied law at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln (UNL), where he became the Director of the internationally renowned Law and Psychology Program for 12 years. He is the Charles Bessey Professor of Psychology and Law at UNL and teaches both graduate courses in the College of Arts and law courses in the College of Law. Dr. Wiener is the past editor of Law and Human Behavior, the official journal of the American Psychology/Law Society (Division 41 of the American Psychological Association). He has served as Secretary-Treasurer for that organization and as Treasurer for the Society of the Psychological Study of Social Issues.
Professor Wiener studies the application of social and cognitive psychology to problems of legal decision-making with a focus on how jurors and juries make decisions in both civil and criminal law. He has published well over 150 papers in peer reviewed journals on topics such as sex trafficking, sexual harassment, age discrimination, voting behavior, and the role of emotions in legal decision making In addition, he is the editor, co-editor of, and major contributor to several books in the University of Nebraska Law and Psychology book series, which include “Social Consciousness in Legal Decision Making: Psychological Perspective” (2007), “Civil Juries And Civil Justice: Psychological And Legal Perspectives” (2008), “Mental Disorder and Criminal Law: Responsibility, Punishment and Competence” (2009),“Emotion and the Law”(2010), Problem Solving Courts (2012), Justice, Conflict and Wellbeing (2014), and Legal Judgment and the Motivation for Justice (2025). He also has expertise in a broad spectrum of areas in applied research and program evaluation.
He is the recipient of funding from the National Science Foundation, National Institute of Justice, and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). Dr. Wiener has served as a research consultant for the Nebraska Administrative Office of Probation (NAOP) and for the Nebraska Supreme Court as an appointee to the Committee on Problem-Solving Courts. Dr. Wiener is a research and evaluation consultant for Lancaster County, the City of Lincoln, Nebraska, and the Vermont Network against Domestic Violence. Professor Wiener has also had an extensive career in trial consulting, including editing a volume of influential papers titled “Handbook of Trial Consulting” (Springer Press, 2011).
