Originally from Alternatives to the High Cost of Litigation

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During the pandemic, most mediations pivoted to online videoconferencing platforms (Gealy et al., 2021; Golann, 2021—all citations appear in full in the References and Resources box at the end of the article). Post-pandemic, parties have the freedom to choose between in-person and online mediation. Research that can inform decisions about mediation format has not kept pace with the meteoric rise in online mediation. While mediators and participants have shared impressions (and some, enthusiasm) about their experiences with online mediation during the pandemic (Franklin, 2021; Paulson, 2021), we need additional research examining whether and how mediation format affects the process and outcome of mediation.

This study adds to the growing literature comparing experiences with online and in person mediation in the context of single plaintiff employment cases. We surveyed U.S. employment attorneys about their online and in-person mediation experiences over a one year period in the wake of the pandemic.

We focused on attorneys because they tend to be the “gatekeepers” to mediation. Laypeople generally lack knowledge about ADR (Blankley et al., 2021; Shestowsky, 2017), and, when faced with litigation, they rely heavily on the advice of counsel when deciding which procedures to use for their case (Shestowsky, 2018).