How can the social sciences be used effectively in class action Title VII discrimination cases?

That was the question Dec. 10 when ILR's Labor and Employment Law Program in New York City assembled a panel of Cornell faculty members from different disciplines in ILR's Conference Center.

Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits employment discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex or national origin. "Social Science Experts and Title VII Class Action Suits: Getting the Evidence in a Discrimination Case" explored how different social science experts address these kinds of cases, where to find a social science expert and how to work with them successfully in presenting a case.

Beth Livingston and Lisa Nishii, assistant professors of human resource studies; Brian Rubineau, assistant professor of organizational behavior; and Elizabeth Karns, senior lecturer in social statistics, applied their expertise to three gender discrimination cases in hiring, occupational segregation and pay inequity.

In one example -- a job qualification test on which women consistently scored lower than men -- Nishii focused on the need to assess whether the test was a true predictor of job performance. Karns, an epidemiologist and attorney, was concerned about how test results would compare with external data from similar exercises.

Conference moderator Adam Klein '87, partner in the law firm Outten & Golden LLP, a co-sponsor of the conference, observed that few continuing legal education programs expose lawyers to subject matter experts as does ILR's Labor and Employment Law Program.

Program Director Esta R. Bigler '70 said one of the founding principles of the program was to "bring the Ithaca campus to New York City and to bring scholars and practitioners together to benefit both."

Cornell ILR's Labor and Employment Law Program offers legal professionals multidisciplinary historical, sociological, economic and political perspectives on legal issues in the workplace.

Marguerite Spencer is a senior marketing communications specialist at the ILR School.