• Login
    View Item 
    •   Home
    • UA Graduate and Undergraduate Research
    • UA Theses and Dissertations
    • Dissertations
    • View Item
    •   Home
    • UA Graduate and Undergraduate Research
    • UA Theses and Dissertations
    • Dissertations
    • View Item
    JavaScript is disabled for your browser. Some features of this site may not work without it.

    Browse

    All of UA Campus RepositoryCommunitiesTitleAuthorsIssue DateSubmit DateSubjectsPublisherJournalThis CollectionTitleAuthorsIssue DateSubmit DateSubjectsPublisherJournal

    My Account

    LoginRegister

    About

    AboutUA Faculty PublicationsUA DissertationsUA Master's ThesesUA Honors ThesesUA PressUA YearbooksUA CatalogsUA Libraries

    Statistics

    Most Popular ItemsStatistics by CountryMost Popular Authors

    Plaintiff entities, awards, and decision justifications in a toxic tort case.

    • CSV
    • RefMan
    • EndNote
    • BibTex
    • RefWorks
    Thumbnail
    Name:
    azu_td_9303309_sip1_m.pdf
    Size:
    5.863Mb
    Format:
    PDF
    Description:
    azu_td_9303309_sip1_m.pdf
    Download
    Author
    Catchings, Billy Wayne.
    Issue Date
    1992
    Keywords
    Toxic torts -- United States.
    Judgments.
    Committee Chair
    Ewbank, Henry
    
    Metadata
    Show full item record
    Publisher
    The University of Arizona.
    Rights
    Copyright © is held by the author. Digital access to this material is made possible by the University Libraries, University of Arizona. Further transmission, reproduction or presentation (such as public display or performance) of protected items is prohibited except with permission of the author.
    Abstract
    The ecological composition of plaintiff entities may vary in size and sociographics in toxic tort litigation. The amount of awards and the justifications for those awards in the various plaintiff situations are unknown. Consolidation which is procedurally distinct from class consolidation procedurally distinct from class action is an alternative litigation strategy for mass torts. While it is well-grounded in English common law, jury decision making in consolidated actions has not been extensively examined by social scientific, legal, or communication researchers. In light of the limited research in this area, awards and decision justifications were gathered from two populations of surrogate jurors. Subjects were asked to decide on the amount of money to award a single plaintiff or a small aggregate, small group, large aggregate or large group of plaintiffs in a written summary of a hypothetical toxic substance case. In addition, respondents were asked to explain the reason(s) for their award decisions. The average award in each situation was in the mid-point area of a range from zero to one million dollars. The amount implies that on average respondents were inclined to give all plaintiff entities approximately $500,000. The justifications for the awards were organized into the following nine categories determined by the application of Toulmin's model of argument: (1)~Company Attribution - CA; (2)~Employee Attribution - EA; (3)~Attribution to Both Employee and Company - BA; (4)~Evaluation Pro-Plaintiff - EPP; (5)~Evaluation Pro-Defendant - EPD; (6)~Sufficient Compensation - SC; (7)~Company Attribution/Sufficient Compensation - CASC; (8)~Employee Attribution/Sufficient Compensation - EASC; and (9)~Both Attribution/Sufficient Compensation - BASC. The underlying warrants(s) in the responses served as the label for each category. The classifications revealed a categorical advantage for the plaintiff(s). Respondents provided justifications beyond strict attributions of responsibility to the parties involved. Need for compensation and a positive regard for plaintiffs, for example, were issues which emerged in the justifications Attribution of responsibility to the employee was a consistent basis for monetary decisions for subjects who decided not to award any compensation. Respondents who were maximum award givers, however, deviated from attributions in the small aggregate, small group, and large aggregate situations.
    Type
    text
    Dissertation-Reproduction (electronic)
    Degree Name
    Ph.D.
    Degree Level
    doctoral
    Degree Program
    Communication
    Graduate College
    Degree Grantor
    University of Arizona
    Collections
    Dissertations

    entitlement

     
    The University of Arizona Libraries | 1510 E. University Blvd. | Tucson, AZ 85721-0055
    Tel 520-621-6442 | repository@u.library.arizona.edu
    DSpace software copyright © 2002-2017  DuraSpace
    Quick Guide | Contact Us | Send Feedback
    Open Repository is a service operated by 
    Atmire NV
     

    Export search results

    The export option will allow you to export the current search results of the entered query to a file. Different formats are available for download. To export the items, click on the button corresponding with the preferred download format.

    By default, clicking on the export buttons will result in a download of the allowed maximum amount of items.

    To select a subset of the search results, click "Selective Export" button and make a selection of the items you want to export. The amount of items that can be exported at once is similarly restricted as the full export.

    After making a selection, click one of the export format buttons. The amount of items that will be exported is indicated in the bubble next to export format.