Lindsey E. Wylie, J.D., Ph.D.
Adult at 18. Senior at 65. High risk, moderate, or low. The law treats these bright lines like laws of nature. Every line misses the ones in between. I tell their stories with data.
The Premise
I study how the legal system measures people: how it decides who counts as an adult, who is high-risk, who is competent, and what follows when those measurement choices are treated as settled facts. Much of my work concerns the unintended consequences of well-intentioned rules, and the distance between what a policy is meant to do and what it does.
My interests are shaped by my experience as a system-involved young person and my desire to highlight under-studied research topics.
Before joining the National Center for State Courts, I directed research at the University of Nebraska Omaha's Juvenile Justice Institute. I have led federally funded research projects and multi-state evaluations across topics in pretrial and diversion, behavioral health in courts, and family violence.
Start Here
A Periodic Table of Hip-Hop Artists
A dataset built to teach measurement validity, sampling bias, uncertainty communication, and visualization design, using a subject people genuinely argue about.
Explore the periodic table →
Which Evaluation Should We Do?
Say what you have and what you want to know, and every evaluation approach lands in one of three piles: what fits, what is the wrong tool and why, and what is close, with the gap named and the work to close it spelled out.
Open the evaluation picker →
Maturity Gap: A Line at 18
Young adults in the legal system, one chart at a time: federal arrest, prison, and recidivism numbers, then a study that measured the same 1,354 people growing up, with a note under every figure on why that chart form got the job.
Read the data story →
Which Format Fits Best?
Say who you are trying to reach and what you want the work to do, and every delivery format sorts into three piles: the ones that fit, the ones that could work with a tweak, and the ones that are the wrong tool here and why.
Open the format picker →
The Method
Applied Research Methods and Design
Randomized studies and quasi-experimental methods across law, psychology, and public policy, with designs matched to the question and to the limits of real-world settings.
Tailored Program Evaluation and Recommendations
Process and outcome evaluations of courts, diversion, and pretrial programs, combining numbers with interviews and observation to produce recommendations programs can act on.
Tests of Measurement Validity and Reliability
Building and testing screening tools and rating scales: evidence that a tool measures what it claims to, consistently.
Practical Storytelling with Data
Professional and graduate teaching that turns careful analysis into work a judge, funder, or community will read and remember, taught on datasets whose flaws are part of the lesson.
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