The truth about lies: What works in detecting high-stakes deception?

摘要

In this paper, we provide our view of the current understanding of high-stakes lies oftenoccurring in forensic contexts. We underscore the importance of avoiding widespreadpitfalls of deception detection and challenging prevailing assumptions concerningstrategies for catching liars. The promise and limitations of each of non-verbal/bodylanguage, facial, verbal/linguistic, and physiological channels in detecting deception arediscussed. In observing the absence of a single cue or behavioural channel thatconsistently reveals deception, a holistic approach with concurrent attention tomultiple channels of a target's behaviour (ideally videotaped for review) and changesfrom baseline behaviour is recommended whenever possible. Among the best-validatedcues to be considered together include: illustrators, blink and pause rate, speech rate,vague descriptions, repeated details, contextual embedding, reproduction of conversa-tions, and emotional 'leakage' in the face. While advocating a reliance on empiricalevidence, we observe that few studies of high-stakes deception yet have been conducted.Further, some manifestations of lying are highly idiosyncratic and difficult to address inquantitative research, pointing to the need for keen observation skills, and psychologicalinsight. A recurring theme is the need for the field to devise innovative approaches forstudying high-stakes lies to promote ecological validity. Ultimately, such work willprovide a strong foundation for the responsible application of deception research inforensic and security settings.