How do you tell when someone is lying? To the eyes? Fussing and fiddling with hands and feet? These are the well-known standard assumptions. But they are myths, according to science. Psychology Magazine conducted research into how we try to recognize liars. It also examined how good the study participants were at unmasking lies. Not good, it turned out. Who, what and why? And how should it be done? Read more. How do you tell when someone is lying? Well, uh… in the eyes? Fumbling with hands? Answers and theoretical assumptions abound. But Psychology Magazine investigated what really happens. Are we as good at seeing through lies as we think? So no. The results of the research even show that we hardly notice when someone is telling us lies.
We pay attention to the wrong things
How did that happen? Precisely because of the standard views mentioned above. A liar averts his gaze while telling all those untruths? No, that is not the case. However, because we focus on such signals, we do not see through the liar.
All these conclusions arise from a survey conducted among four thousand readers of Psychology Magazine via the ‘self-test’. The test subjects tested their own skills in seeing through lies on the internet. They were also asked questions about telling lies themselves.
50% are wrong when detecting lies
To see how good the participants were at detecting the lie, two videos were posted online. One contained a lie, the other did not. You guessed it, the participants in the study were allowed to determine which of those two videos contained the lie. What turned out? Half of the participants were correct when identifying the lie, and no less than half were incorrect. An interesting detail is that this is the same true-failure score as a so-called ‘chance level’ produces. In other words, if the participants had just gambled a bit, it would have yielded the same result.
The myth unmasked: how can you recognize a lie?
As mentioned, our poor ability to recognize the lie lies in paying attention to the wrong things. When asked how people determine whether someone is lying or not, 60% of participants responded with an obvious criterion: they mainly pay attention to someone’s body language. Nearly half of respondents believe that liars won’t look you in the eye (49 percent). An even larger number, namely seven in ten participants (70%), expect a liar to make more nervous movements. It sounds plausible. But according to scientific research, these are (although persistent) myths.
How do you catch the liar?
Now that we’re done with looking at body language and rolling eyes, the question is: how do you catch the liar in a way that makes a difference? Actually it’s obvious. A lie story contains contradictions, detours, overly emphasized confirmation or denial and other signals that the story is not constructed naturally and smoothly.
What are we lying about?
- 79% lie if they don’t like something, such as a present
- 64% lie about the reason why an appointment is canceled
- 34% about how much money she or he has spent
- 31% by weight
- 28% about the quality of sex life
- 18% about achievements, such as study or sports results
- 16% on salary
- 10% on employment history (on the CV)
(source: Psychology Magazine research)
What do people lie about?
We can’t do anything about it, the stereotypes are being fulfilled again. Psychology Magazine presented the participants in the study with a number of topics with the question: do you ever lie about this? It turned out that women lie more often about their weight, i.e. about a standard subject for women: the diet. Women also lie more often to promote social harmony, for example by lying about something they actually don’t like: ‘It’s a really unique gift!’ In addition, it appears that the vast majority of women in the Netherlands are financially dependent. Women lie relatively often about how much money they spend. The fact that men still have social priorities in terms of status and money is also underlined here: they lie more often about performance and income.