HE RECENT decisions in Total Containment, Inc. v. Dayco Products, Inc.[1]� and Trouble v. The Wet Seal, Inc.[2]� oblige us to reflect on the following question: Have 20 years of intense jurisprudence had any real effect on the standards for admissibility of nonscientific expert testimony in litigation?
A snapshot comparison of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania’s 1981 decision in Zenith Radio Corp. v. Matsushita Elec. Indus. Co.[3]� with these recent decisions concerning the admissibility of nonscientific expert testimony reveals that the landscape virtually remains the same. This may come as a surprising revelation to many practitioners who have watched the Supreme Court and the Legislature continually alter and refine the standards for admissibility of such experts’ work, but the result may not be as radical as some may have imagined.
