Document Type
Article
Publication Title
Judicature
Publication Date
9-2023
ISSN
0022-5800
Page Number
22
Keywords
judicial stress, mental and physical health, secondary trauma
Disciplines
Health Law and Policy | Judges | Law
Abstract
Judges have always faced significant stressors, including the burden of consequential decision-making, exposure to disturbing evidence, and isolation. While every judicial assignment has its own mix of concerns, challenge is a constant. Recurrent experiences of serious stressors place judges at risk of burn-out, secondary trauma, poor mental and physical health, and substance use disorders.
Historically, such issues have been addressed primarily in the context of judicial fitness - that is, only when individual judges were suffering to the degree that they could no longer competently perform their duties would the system respond, and then usually for the purpose of discipline or removal.
In recent years, though, the focus has shifted. Judicial leaders, health professionals, judge and lawyer assistance programs, and social scientists have called for broader, nonpunitive attention to the stressors faced by all judges, not only those who have become impaired.
Recommended Citation
Terry Maroney, David X. Swenson, Joan Bibelhausen, and David Marc,
How Are You Holding Up? The State of Judges' Well-Being: A Report on the 2019 National Judicial, 107 Judicature. 22
(2023)
Available at: https://scholarship.law.vanderbilt.edu/faculty-publications/1407