Rest Assured: The Critical Legal Role of Sleep in Wellness and Attorney Competency (Presented by the Federal Bar Association Professional Development Committee)

Elizabeth A. Kensinger, Professor | Boston College

Elizabeth A. Kensinger, received her Ph.D. in Neuroscience at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. After a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard University and Massachusetts General Hospital, she joined the faculty of Boston College, where she is Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience and Director of the Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience laboratory. Her research is supported by the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health. She has published over 200 research articles on how factors including sleep, stress, and aging affect memory and emotion, and she co-authored Why We Forget and How to Remember Better (Oxford University Press, 2023).

Joan Bibelhausen, Executive Director | Lawyers Concerned for Lawyers

Joan Bibelhausen has served as Executive Director of Lawyers Concerned for Lawyers since 2005. She is nationally recognized for her work in the lawyer assistance and diversity and inclusion realms and has significant additional training in counseling, mental health and addiction, diversity, employment issues, and management. Joan has a passion for reducing the stigma about asking for and offering help to do our best work and live our best lives in the legal profession. She has spent her career working with legal professionals at a crossroads because of mental illness and addiction concerns, well-being, trauma, stress, and related issues.

Joan wrote Lawyer Assistance Programs Provide a Lifeline for Juriste International, published in June 2024, coauthored “Stress and Resiliency in the US Judiciary” for the ABA 2020 Journal of the Professional Lawyer, and frequently writes for Minnesota and national bar publications. In 2022 she was recognized by the American Bar Association Commission on Lawyer Assistance Programs with a Meritorious Service award in recognition of Extraordinary Service to Lawyer Assistance Programs. She received the Minnesota State Bar Association’s Lifetime Achievement Award for 2024.

Benjamin de Seingalt, Corporate Counsel and Director of Compliance and Privacy | MarketVision Research

Benjamin de Seingalt is the Corporate Counsel and Director of Compliance and Privacy for MarketVision Research, one of the largest primary market research and consulting firms in the United States. His work focuses on global privacy compliance, corporate social responsibility, artificial intelligence, and postmarket drug surveillance. Ben is also the Senior Fellow for Artificial Intelligence at the Lawyers’ Committee for Cultural Heritage Preservation and serves on the Editorial Board for The Federal Lawyer magazine, the board of the Federal Bar Association’s Section on Civil Rights, the BHBIA’s Ethics and Compliance Committee, ESOMAR’s AI Task Force Coordinating Committee, Intellus’ Data Integrity and Artificial Intelligence Task Force, and the Insights Association’s Standards Committee. He is a graduate of Tulane University Law School, the A.B. Freeman School of Business, and Washington College.

I. Understanding the Neuroscience of Sleep – Discuss the science behind sleep and its effects on cognitive function, decision-making, and emotional regulation | 2:00pm – 2:20pm

II. Ethical Implications of Sleep Deprivation – Analyze how sleep deprivation impacts attorney competency and the ability to uphold ethical standards | 2:20pm – 2:35pm

III. Strategies to Improve Sleep and Resources for Help – Cover tips for improving sleep hygiene, reducing sleep-related anxiety, and where to seek support | 2:35pm – 2:50pm

IV. Questions & Answers (10 minutes) – Open discussion and participant | 2:50pm – 3:00pm