Managing bias risks: information management strategies for forensic speech and audio analysis

In this article, we explain and discuss the procedures used by the Forensic Voice Centre, UK, to manage forensic cases and mitigate the risks presented by cognitive biases: we define these simply as ‘how information, organisational or motivational factors, ways of thinking, and ways of doing can affect forensic outcomes’. This article outlines the practical steps taken in every case to manage information to avoid exposing experts to contextual information which may pose a risk of biasing their conclusions. With reference to hypothetical case examples based on our experience, we outline the different roles that staff members take on in different types of cases including forensic voice comparison, transcription, disputed utterance analysis and other types of forensic speech and audio casework.