Judgment is the process of looking at a situation to make a choice or form an opinion. It can also mean the result of that process or the ability to make thoughtful decisions.

In casual situations, judgment might mean stating an opinion as if it is a fact. In logic, judgment is used to say that a statement is true. In a legal trial, judgment refers to the final decision made by a judge, based on evidence, laws, and past court decisions, called adjudication. In psychology, judgment informally describes how well a person thinks and makes decisions, often linked to wisdom. In formal psychology, judgment and decision making (JDM) is the process by which people think, make choices, and develop opinions and beliefs.

Judgements in law

In law, a judgment is a court's decision about the rights and responsibilities of people involved in a legal case. Judgments also usually explain why the court made a specific order.

In British English, the word "judgment" is often used the same way as "judicial opinion" when talking about higher courts. In American English, people usually keep a clear difference between a court's explanation of a decision (called an "opinion") and the actual decision itself (called a "judgment").

In Canadian English, the phrase "reasons for judgment" and "judgment" are sometimes used interchangeably. However, "reasons for judgment" refers to the court's explanation of its decision, while "judgment" refers to the final order that decides the rights and responsibilities of the people involved.

The word "judgment" comes from the Latin word "iudicare," which means "to judge." It entered English through Old French as "jugement" around the 13th century. At first, the term described both legal trials and religious ideas like "Judgment Day." In English law, judgments began as medieval written orders that later became court decisions. Over time, new legal methods, such as "summary judgment," were created in the 19th century to quickly resolve cases involving unpaid debts. These methods were later included in legal systems like the U.S. Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (1938), which allow courts to dismiss cases that have no legal basis.

Judgement in cognitive science and psychology

In cognitive psychology and related areas such as experimental philosophy, social psychology, behavioral economics, and experimental economics, judgment is part of a group of mental processes that help people think, decide, and form beliefs and opinions (called judgment and decision making, or JDM). This includes looking at information, comparing evidence, making choices, and reaching conclusions. Judgments are often affected by mental shortcuts, past experiences, social situations, skills (like understanding numbers or probability), and personal traits (such as a preference for logical thinking). In research, the Society for Judgment and Decision Making is an international group of scholars who study this topic. They publish a journal where experts review articles before they are published, called Judgment and Decision Making.

Research by Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky in the 1970s and 1980s found mental shortcuts, such as the availability heuristic and anchoring, that often cause predictable mistakes in thinking. Their work explained how people compare results to a starting point, leading to a tendency to value losses more than equal gains. This idea is used in behavioral economics and policy design. Later, Kahneman wrote a book called Thinking, Fast and Slow (2011), which describes two types of thinking: "System 1" (quick, instinctive judgments) and "System 2" (slow, thoughtful judgments).

Recent studies in cognitive neuroscience have linked judgment processes to brain areas like the prefrontal cortex, often looking at how quick, intuitive decisions are handled, as seen in brain scans during risk-related tasks. In artificial intelligence, large language models (such as GPT-4) copy human judgment patterns, including loss aversion and the gambler’s fallacy. This raises questions about using AI in legal predictions, though these models improve accuracy in planned tasks.

Judgement in ethics

Ethical judgment means checking actions, goals, or results against moral standards, which is different from judging based on practical decisions. Philosophers argue whether these judgments are objective (based on reason) or subjective (based on relationships), influenced by ideas like deontology and virtue ethics.

A key difference, first studied by Jean Piaget and later improved by Elliot Turiel, divides moral judgments (about harm, fairness, and rights, such as "stealing is wrong even if rules allow it") from conventional judgments (about rules that depend on situations, like "school uniforms are required"). This idea, supported by research on how cultures develop, suggests morals are universal, while rules are arbitrary. This helps explain why children often follow moral rules more strictly.

In Kantian ethics, moral judgments come from the categorical imperative, which creates rules that apply to everyone through practical reasoning. These rules differ from hypothetical imperatives, which relate to skills or knowledge. Critics like Hegel believed such judgments change over time, shaped by the shared ethical beliefs of society.

Judgement in philosophy

Aristotle noticed that the ability to judge has two parts: making statements and considering definitions. He explained these clearly. A statement made through judging can say something is true or false. When someone judges, they either say two things are connected or say they are not connected. Definitions that are judgments are those that combine two or more ideas, not just examples people usually think of—these are called constitutive definitions.

Later thinkers, such as Mortimer Adler, wondered if "abstract definitions" created by combining examples in the mind are truly different from judgments.

In everyday language, the word "judgment" is often used without clear meaning. Aristotle pointed out that while statements can be taken from judgments and called "true" or "false," the actual things these words refer to are only "true" or "false" in relation to the act of judging or sharing that judgment. This means they are either "fitting" or "not fitting."

Immanuel Kant, in his books Critique of Pure Reason (1781) and Critique of the Power of Judgment (1790), said that judgment is the most important part of human thinking. He described it as a mental process that helps people understand objects through sensing. Kant's ideas stress that judgment connects thinking abilities to create objective truths. "Determining" judgments group specific examples into general ideas, while "reflective" judgments look for general ideas in specific examples.

Judgement in religion

The Last Judgment is an idea that began in Zoroastrianism and is also found in Abrahamic religions, which include Christianity, Islam, and Judaism.

In Christianity, the New Testament talks about judgment between people in the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus says, "Do not judge, or you too will be judged" (Matthew 7:1, NIV), warning against judging others unfairly.

In Islam, judgment happens on Yawm al-Qiyamah, the Day of Judgment. On this day, Allah brings all souls back to life to be judged based on their actions, which are recorded in the Kitab (book of records). This determines whether souls go to paradise or hell, showing both mercy and justice (Quran 99:7–8).

Hinduism sees judgment as part of karma, the rule that actions (samskaras) affect future lives (samsara) and the goal of freedom from rebirth (moksha). The Bhagavad Gita describes this as a natural result of actions, not caused by a god.

Buddhism connects judgment to Right View (Pali: sammā diṭṭhi), which is part of the Noble Eightfold Path. It teaches that understanding what is ethical helps end the cycle of rebirth and reach nirvana, as explained in the Dhammapada.