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MIT’s cognitive science research team focused on “Why are legal documents so difficult to read?” After research, they came to an unexpected conclusion: complexity in legal documents is not a simple mistake, but a “device for expressing authority.”
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Professor Edward Gibson's research team argued that the language of legal documents is similar to magic spells and named this the 'magic spell hypothesis.'
“In English culture, when casting magic spells, we use archaic words and rhymes. Legal documents are similar. The sentence structure itself symbolizes the authority of ‘this is the law.’”
- To test this hypothesis, the researchers conducted an experiment with about 200 non-lawyers. Participants were asked to write stories about crimes and laws against crime, and the results were surprising. When writing laws, he frequently used center-embedding, but when writing stories, he used a concise and clear style.
“When writing law, people seem to instinctively choose a complex writing style that is ‘legal’.”
- In another experiment, people wrote laws and then had them write explanation sentences to foreigners. Although the law was still complexly written, the explanatory text was surprisingly plain. It was evidence that law was not considered everyday language, but was considered an ‘other language’ with authority.
“The explanatory text rarely used nested structures, which shows that people apply a special style only to the law.”
- This study was the first step toward making legal documents easier to understand. Similar attempts have been made in the past. In the 1970s, President Nixon ordered federal regulations to be written in "common language." However, the legal language has not changed significantly. Professor Gibson was optimistic about this study.
“We are just beginning to understand what makes legal documents complex. This will enable us to make a difference.”
- Legal documents must ultimately exist for the people. Researchers are digging into the origins of this complex writing style with the goal of changing the law so that more people can understand it. Since early American law was based on British law, we will analyze its roots back to England and further examine whether a similar structure appears in documents such as the ancient Code of Hammurabi.
"Reading a legal document shouldn't have to be deciphered like a magic spell. I hope one day it will read as naturally as a novel."
