Testwiki:Featured article candidates/CSI effect/archive2

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted by SandyGeorgia 01:20, 16 April 2011 [1].

CSI effect

Template:La {{Wikipedia:Featured article tools|1=CSI effect}}

Nominator(s): Cryptic C62 · Talk 02:48, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

The first FAC was very productive, but the eventual consensus was that the article would benefit from an independent prose review. Casliber and Ruhrfisch both helped to tighten up the prose; Llywrch looked the article over as well. I like bagels. --Cryptic C62 · Talk 02:48, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Image review - one image, PD, no problems that I can see. Nikkimaria (talk) 04:01, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Source review, mostly for formatting at the moment.

  • Should give page numbers for Sellwood
  • Be consistent in whether authors are listed first or last name first
  • Title for Toobin?
  • Check volume # for Pineda-Volk, and should use endash in the date range
  • Be consistent in how multiple authors are notated
  • It's not required to include retrieval dates for weblinks to print-based sources, but if you're going to you must do so consistently

In general, reference formatting could use a bit of tidying for consistency. Nikkimaria (talk) 04:01, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Sellwood pages specified. Toobin titled. Name order consistent-ified. Pineda-Volk cleaned up. Multi-author format consistent-ified. Accessdates added. --Cryptic C62 · Talk 19:56, 27 March 2011 (UTC)
  • Support. I wanted to throw in my two cents about this article over and above the FA criteria. I did some major work on this page about four years ago, as I am a professor who has studied and written about the CSI effect (in fact, I'm cited a few times in the article). Due to time constraints, I don't devote nearly as much time to WP as I once did, but I wanted to be sure to say that I think Cryptic (and others) did an excellent job overhauling and updating this article. The article gives an accurate and comprehensive view of the current state of research on the CSI effect, and, at the very least, I'd like to throw in my support for FA, for whatever it's worth. (And, lest anyone think there be a COI, I can say that the CSI effect isn't really my "thing" anymore, so I don't really have anything to gain if it goes FA.) -Nicktalk 06:07, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Comment It seems, from the way the article is written, that the CSI effect refers to an effect to Americans. The following quotes may exhibit this:

  • "Although this belief is widely held among American legal professionals, several studies have shown that crime shows are unlikely to cause such an effect."
  • "Based on the Nielsen ratings, six of the top ten most popular television shows in the United States in 2005 were crime dramas"
  • "Real murder cases often involve a perpetrator and a victim who are both young black males, a situation which is rarely portrayed on television."
  • "By 2009, more than 250 stories about the CSI effect had appeared in different media,[13] including articles in National Geographic,[14] Scientific American,[15][16] and U.S. News & World Report."
  • "Although the CSI effect is a recent phenomenon, it has long been recognized that media portrayals of the United States legal system are capable of significantly altering public awareness, knowledge, and opinions of it."
  • etc. etc.

Therefore, I think it should be made clear right from the lead that this is an American effect.

While it is certainly true that most of the literature is written by/about/for Americans (unsurprising since CSI is an American franchise), it is also true that the effect is felt in other countries. Australia, the UK, Germany, Switzerland, and Canada are all mentioned in the article; to state that this is an exclusively an American effect would therefore be incorrect. I suppose that it would be appropriate to insert a statement along the lines of "While the CSI effect is discussed primarily in the context of the United States, it has also affected several other countries, including blah, blah, blah, and blah." Do you (and anyone else who is interested) think this would help? If so, where do you think would be a good spot for it in the lead? --Cryptic C62 · Talk 02:56, 28 March 2011 (UTC)
It should therefore be made clear, on a more local basis, that it is the US discussed. For example, in the sentence "Real murder cases often involve a perpetrator and a victim who are both young black males, a situation which is rarely portrayed on television." really ought to have "in the case of the US" somewhere, because I expect that in Switzerland, or some other non-US country, real murder cases don't often involve two young black males. Randomblue (talk) 04:45, 28 March 2011 (UTC)
The problem that often arises is that the original source doesn't explicitly state what area(s) a given fact pertains to. Consider the example you've highlighted, which comes from this source. Should we limit the statement's relevance to those cities in which Zahn has visited crime scenes? Or can we generalize it to the entire United States? Or perhaps we should avoid making it area-specific at all by changing "young black male" to "young minority"? Can we do any of these things without committing WP:SYNTHESIS and WP:ORIGINAL RESEARCH? It's a tricky situation, and one which I would want to get more input on before committing to a plan of action. --Cryptic C62 · Talk 16:48, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Minor point:

  • "get results very quickly" -> vague Randomblue (talk) 02:27, 28 March 2011 (UTC)
    Changed "very quickly" to "instantaneously". --Cryptic C62 · Talk 02:56, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

Comments – Only a handful of nit-picks to report...

  • Background: "and was in its 11th season in 2010—2011." The em dash should be a smaller en dash.
  • Trials: "They surveyed more than 1000 jurors". Another minor style point, but the number should have a comma in it per WP:MOSNUM.
  • Academia: Is Master's (degree) usually capitalized in this context?
  • Crimes: The full CSI show title has an s at the end that isn't used previously. I'd say remove it.
  • Police investigations: Again minor. but "among" would be a tiny bit less wordy than "amongst" If you can save two letters, why not do it? Giants2008 (27 and counting) 02:31, 28 March 2011 (UTC)
Dashed, comma'd, decapitalized, de-essed, and... I can't think of a snappy verb that means "removed two letters", but I did that too. Thanks for the feedback! --Cryptic C62 · Talk 02:56, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

Support - I did an informal review and light copyedit on this per Cryptic C62's request, and have re-read it just now. I find it meets the FA criteria and am happy to support. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 02:35, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Image review - there is one image in the article and it is freely licensed. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 02:35, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

  • Comments. There are a few problems I see with the wording and such (noted below). I also think, more generally, that the article could benefit from a little more intellectual linkage to other phenomenon. In "Is it the CSI Effect or Do We Just Distrust Juries", for example, Wendy Brickell links the CSI effect to broader issues involving expert testimony, the "Perry Mason syndrome" (expectation of certain forms of lawyer behavior and expectations for extracting confessions), and the idea that the CSI effect is just an excuse used by bad lawyers. Also, a number of articles, such as Sheila Stephens's "The CSI Effect on Real Crime Labs" propose some remedies for the perceived effect that probably are worth mentioning. Sir Nils (talk) 05:15, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
I definitely agree with your idea of including Brickell's bad lawyer excuse and Stephens's proposed remedies. I hadn't come across these articles in my own research, but I'll be sure to look through them tonight. Unless I'm mistaken, the other ideas you mention are already incorporated in the article. Expert testimony is mentioned in the second paragraph of Trials and the Perry Mason syndrome is linked at the end of Background. --Cryptic C62 · Talk 21:42, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
I have added some material from Stephens into Academia and material from Brickell into Trials. --Cryptic C62 · Talk 00:24, 8 April 2011 (UTC)
  • "which first aired in 2000, and was in its 11th season in 2010–2011." Nitpicky, but at the moment this season is ongoing, so this should probably read "is"
Changed to "and entered its 11th season in 2010."
  • "Tammy Klein, the lead investigator on the case, said that the killings she investigates are committed by people "who for the most part are pretty stupid." The lead investigator on what case?
Clarified: the McKinney case, which was covered in the previous paragraph. At one point that discussion and this sentence were adjacent, but some extra material was evidently inserted somewhere along the way.
Thanks for the feedback! --Cryptic C62 · Talk 21:42, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
  • Support I disclose that I copyedited it and read it a few times before. I think it is tighter now and meets criteria on prose and formatting. I think it's over the line. Casliber (talk · contribs) 10:53, 6 April 2011 (UTC)


Comments. As always, feel free to revert my copyediting. Please check the edit summaries. - Dank (push to talk) 02:20, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

  • I'm not familiar with adding chapter numbers, such as "Ch. IIA", to superscripts in Wikipedia, and it's not recommended by for instance Chicago. But there's a lot I don't know about citation issues, and if it's supported at WP:CITE, then I don't have an objection.
  • "Real murder cases in the United States often involve a perpetrator and a victim who are both young black males, a situation which is rarely portrayed on television.": Black-on-black crime is indeed underrepresented on TV, but one of your sources is just a list of articles, and the other one says "The most common murder cases, according to Zahn, involve one young black male killing another young black male ...", which feels more like an offhand comment than a careful statistic from a careful study to me. If you can find another source, great. My partner says he may be able to get a useful study from ACLU friends.
    I've rephrased the statement in question to include the UK and I've backed it up with approximately 0.1253⋅10−eπi new references. --Cryptic C62 · Talk 01:47, 14 April 2011 (UTC)
  • "The notion that these inaccurate portrayals could affect criminal behavior and public perception of forensic evidence was dubbed the CSI effect": This definition differs from your first paragraph; consistency would be good.
    I've removed "criminal behavior" to make this more similar to the original definition and to avoid getting too specific. --Cryptic C62 · Talk 01:47, 14 April 2011 (UTC)
  • "in different media": If you're not sure which media, it might be best just to delete this part. If you know they meant, say, TV and print, it would be better to say that.
    I reread the source, and it seems to indicate that the 250 stories refers to newspapers and magazines, so I've inserted that. --Cryptic C62 · Talk 03:24, 13 April 2011 (UTC)
  • Support on prose per standard disclaimer. Nicely done. These are my edits. I have no competence in this area and I didn't evaluate the sources. - Dank (push to talk) 02:20, 13 April 2011 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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