Lies Liars will tell

LIES LIARS WILL TELL - Camille Vidal

Lying, we have all lied sooner or later in our lives, even if some of us refuse to admit it. Like everything, some lies are bigger than others. Some people decide to lie about what time they got home after a night out, others lie about stealing other things such as money. You would be surprised to learn that more than 80% of our lies go undetected. Most people have trouble recognizing false statements. Some tests do exist but most of them are not fully accurate. A lot of studies are being done to detect truths from lies. A lie is an affirmation that is supposedly false, that isn’t real. During this essay, we will try to see, why people lie, how to detect a liar and what the consequences of lying are. So, why do people lie? Keep in mind that there are other reasons, the examples I will state are simply the ones I personally found more important.

The first reason why is mainly for Self-Protection or protecting someone else, usually from harm or to avoid the consequences of an action. For instance, if a stranger knock on the door of your house, and a child is alone in the house, he will lie, at least we hope he will. He will, for example, say that his mom is on the phone and can’t come to the door right now. He lied, but only to protect himself from the stranger. You can also lie to protect someone you care about. In a similar situation, a complete stranger, a little scary looking, comes to you and asks where your friend is. You can lie about where he is, as a way to protect him/her.

Another form of self-protection is protecting your reputation, lying about something you have done, actions you might regret that you know will harm the way you are seen.

Following the same idea of self-protection, some people lie because they are scared to disappoint. Like your parents, you might tell them you got an 18 in a test when in reality you got a 12. You lie in order to protect yourself; you don’t want to disappoint anyone.

Of course, we still have the obvious ones which are avoiding punishment. In fact, it is proven that avoiding punishment or avoiding trouble is one of the main reasons that people lie, regardless of the age of the person: children, teenagers, or even adults. Like being late at school or work, instead of saying it was because you were out late partying, you will probably say that you had car trouble, or that your alarm didn’t go off.

Maintaining privacy. Even the people who like being surrounded all the time need a little time to themselves, time to breathe and simply be alone. Furthermore, some things have to stay private. In order to do so, sometimes we need to lie a little. You are on the phone with someone and don’t want to tell the others who you were talking to, you usually lie and say it was someone else. You don’t want to go out of your house, so you lie saying you are busy. Of course, they are all little lies, and they don’t really matter. But they are still lying

The thrill of it, some people don’t really have reasons to lie, they just do it because they like it. They like to tell lies, to invent a life. They have no actual reason to, they just do it to see if they will get caught, see if someone will call them off, as a way to take control. Others also lie because they want it to be true so badly, they actually start believing in their lie.

Another really common one is avoiding embarrassment, I myself have to admit I am guilty of this one. We have all found ourselves in an uncomfortable situation, a child who will say he spilled his glass of water instead of saying he wet the bed. Or in my case, pretend I am on the phone while waiting for a friend because I am embarrassed to simply be standing alone, of course, I realize there is nothing to be embarrassed about.

Now that we understand a little more about the motivation for lying, I find it important to define how to detect liars, once again, there are other ways to detect and they do not work for everyone but overall, those signs can be detected. Start by asking neutral questions, basic questions like the weather, anything where you know they will have to tell the truth, while you do so, observe their body language and eye movement. They should look at you in the eyes. When you do and they continue with their story watch if they look somewhere else if they stop with the eye contact. Do they shift stance? Glance in one direction or the other? Or look you dead in the eye? Make sure you ask enough questions to observe a pattern.

Continuing with the idea of body language, liars often pull their body inward when lying, because they make themselves feel smaller. In a way makes them less noticeable. They will tend to hunch their back and hide their hands or fingers. Check if their body posture goes along with the story they are telling. Another important factor is observing facial expressions. Some people will change their skin tone to a slighter rose cheek, others will raise their eyebrows slightly or even lift up their nostrils, or blink rapidly. Each of these changes in facial expressions signifies an increase in brain activity as lying begins. Listen to the tone of the voice, to the cadence of the voice, liars will tend to change the tone of their voices. They might start talking slightly more quickly or slowly. Often, the sentences they use become more complex as their brain works on overdrive to keep up with their tale.

Although those signs can be accurate, some researchers show that we can not only focus our intention on body language.

Researcher Howard Ehrlichman, a psychologist who has been studying eye movements since the 1970s, has found that eye movements do not necessarily signify lying. In fact, he suggests that shifting eyes could mean that a person is thinking, or more precisely, that he or she is accessing their long-term memory.

One meta-analysis found that you should focus on those factors:

Being vague: If the speaker seems to intentionally leave out important details, it might be because they are lying.
Vocal uncertainty: If the person seems unsure or insecure, they are more likely to be perceived as lying.
Indifference: Shrugging, lack of expression, and a bored posture can be signs of lying since the person is trying to avoid conveying emotions and possible tells.
Overthinking: If the individual seems to be thinking too hard to fill in the details of the story, it might be because they are deceiving you.
Reverse story: Lastly but not least, ask them to tell the story in reverse, the odds are they will get confused and will change details, or get mix up in their ideas, and it is during that moment you can call them off on their lies.

Indeed, we all lie, we all do it for our own reasons, but I will always believe that there are always consequences to lying. In serious lies, there is always a threat of being discovered and damaging the trust relationship you have with the person. I take it from experience that once you learned someone lied to you, the whole relationship changes, it will probably never be the same because if someone lied to you once, what makes you think they won’t do it again? Trust is one of the hardest things to gain, but the easiest to lose. No matter the importance of the lie, no matter how much you think it’s the right decision, it is always preferable to say the truth. Lies are like snowballs, once you lie, in order to be caught lying you usually end up lying again, and again. I always said and always believe that only three things cannot stay hidden: the moon, the sun, and the truth.