Deception

Can Cops Catch Liars?

Maureen O'Sullivan, Ph.D. — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 23:41:40 +0000

When my totally satisfactory son was a child, we would watch Sesame Street together. At that time, Sesame Street had the hots for "Some" "All" and "None". Every show had something about inclusive and exclusive adjectives. Unfortunately, some people did not watch SS enough, as evidenced by the current confusion about whether cops are any good at lie detection.

Look at these two syllogisms:

1. Most people are only at chance in detecting lies.

Most cops are people.

Therefore, most cops are only at chance in detecting lies.

Is this correct, or is number 2 better?

2. Truth wizards can detect lies most of the time.

Some truth wizards are cops.

Therefore, some cops can detect deception most of the time.

Both syllogisms are correct (at least correct enough for a post!). Most cops, like most people are at chance in their lie detection accuracy. But some cops are expert lie detectors. The conclusion about most cops comes from research on unselected groups of law enforcement personnel; the conclusion about some cops comes from research with highly selected individuals and groups of law enforcement personnel.

In the 1990's, Paul Ekman, Mark Frank and I described two highly accurate law enforcement groups (Secret Service agents and highly motivated federal investigators). We also reported only chance accuracy scores for several other groups of police professionals. More recently, in a study done in England, Mark Frank found differences in accuracy among different types of law enforcement personnel. Homicide detectives were very accurate while patrol officers were not. So some kinds of cops can catch liars sometimes.

In 2000, I started interviewing so-called "Truth Wizards," people who obtained scores of 80% or better on at least two of three standardized lie detection measures. These were not easy tests since most people achieved only chance scores (near 50%) on them. All three tests show "high stakes" lies in which the liars and truth tellers were highly motivated, either for personal reasons or by some significant positive and/or negative reinforcement (substantial reward, serious punishment).

Paul Ekman has argued for many years that high stakes testing materials are necessary to determine lie detection accuracy, otherwise the lies and truths will not have the relevant emotional and cognitive behaviors necessary to uncover the truth. Remember the last time a police officer interviewed you? Did your heart race? Was your mind numb? Was your mouth dry? And this can happen even if interview is about a broken tail light or a missing tag. Imagine if the interview were about a murder. Police are used to interviewing people in situations in which they are both emotionally and cognitively aroused.

My colleagues and I recently examined this hypothesis in a review examining all studies of lie detection accuracy in police groups. We found that police officers tested with high stakes lies were significantly more accurate than those tested with low stakes lies. No police officers tested with low stakes lies were above chance in accuracy.

So to determine whether police officers are accurate in lie detection be sure to specify whether it is some, all, or some

So you want to be a professional lie detector?

Maureen O'Sullivan, Ph.D. — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 22:38:40 +0000

Following the success of the Fox TV show “Lie to Me,” I have received many requests from people who believe that they have very good people-reading skills and would like a job like the one held by Torres, the “natural” lie detector, on the show. On the show this character is given a briefcase full of money to join the Lightman Group, a lie detection company. She has no education and gets to do interesting people-related work wearing cool clothes and hanging out in a fabulous, high-tech office.

Sad to say, that dream job is just a dream. I know of no business that is devoted exclusively to lie detection. In real life, Paul Ekman (the model for Dr. Cal Lightman) is a retired research psychologist. He consulted with police agencies and taught many kinds of law enforcement what he knew about behavior and deception. But he did not do investigations himself. That is TV reality, not real reality. And he did research for 40 years before his contributions received the recognition they now have.

A variety of professionals (police, lawyers, therapist, dispute mediators, arbitrators, behavioral researchers) require lie-detection skills or knowledge to do their jobs, but they are paid to do their total job. Lie detection is just part of it. And the notion of a “natural” lie detector is also unlikely. (blogs.psychologytoday.com/blog/deception/200903/are-there-any-natural-lie-detectors)

I have been studying expert lie detectors for nearly 20 years and the vast majority of them are educated. Only a few do not have a college education. Some of the Truth Wizards, who were already known to be good lie detectors and good interviewers, went back to get doctorates when they were in their 30’s and 40’s. But where can you start - if you want to get a job that uses your lie detection or people reading skills?

1) Pick a relevant occupation (your day job!).

2) Get educated in that job, either through a relevant college major like psychology or criminal justice, or through getting a job in the field and finding someone to mentor you.

3) Travel. Expose yourself to a wide variety of people of all ages, social classes and ethnicities. One of the differences between Truth Wizards and others is the diverse life exposure they have had.

4) Be passionate about the truth and about understanding people. You can be a good athlete without making it to the Olympics. To be an Olympic athlete, you need to be fanatically motivated and dedicated. To be a Truth Wizard, you need to be open to your biases and limitations, to seek feedback and to practice, practice, practice.

5) Read everything you can about lie detection and behavioral observation. Take workshops and courses.

There are many paths to becoming an expert lie detector, but you must choose one with heart. Relaxing in your arm chair and commenting on the passing parade of humanity won’t do it.

Micro Expressions and A Good Liar

Maureen O'Sullivan, Ph.D. — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 20:36:45 +0000

Micro expressions are fleeting facial expressions that occur when some people try to repress or suppress an emotion. If they are unable to do so completely, the emotion may flash onto the face very rapidly, sometimes for as short a time as 1/125th of a second. Although most of us miss most of these fleeting expressions, about 85% of people can improve their micro expression recognition ability with training. (http://www.paulekman.com/mett.html)

Micro expressions tell you a lot about a person's emotion. Whether they tell you that a person is lying is another matter.

A micro expression suggests that someone may be trying to conceal an emotion and correct recognition of the micro expression tells you what that emotion is. The emotion may or may not be related to a lie.

For example, a fear micro might appear because the liar is afraid she will be caught in her lie. But an innocent person might be also afraid - that her truth will not be believed. And the fear could be totally unrelated to truth or deception. It might have just popped into her head that she didn't turn off the gas stove when she left home several hours earlier.

Micro expressions tell us what a person is feeling, but not why they are feeling it. Interpreting the emotions of others, knowing why they are feeling what they are feeling, is necessary for accurate lie detection.

In a recent TV series, "Lie to Me," when a relevant micro expression appears the characters in the show instantly declaim "He's lying!" Unfortunately, this suggests that lie detection is easy once you master micro expression recognition. Expert lie detectors will tell you: It ain't necessarily so. Experts use micro expressions (in addition to other clues) as an indicator that something may be amiss. Then they seek further information before calling someone a liar.

So micro expressions DO communicate a great deal about emotion, and MAY communicate information about deception.

Are there any "natural" lie detectors?

Maureen O'Sullivan, Ph.D. — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 17:40:26 +0000

Short answer: No

Long answer: It depends on what you mean by "natural." Are there any "natural" Olympic athletes? Or are they people with inborn talents and abilities that they have developed through motivated practice and feedback in a particular sport? For all his natural athleticism, Michael Jordan was a superior basketball player and a merely good baseball player.

Although a number of expert human lie detectors have been identified over the last twenty years, none of these experts (termed "truth wizards" in my research) could be described as "naturals." Most of them developed their lie detection abilities in response to a personal or professional need.

One wizard started his career as a motorcycle cop, with all the machismo that suggests. Later, as an investigator, he noticed that it took a lot of physical energy to get the results he did. Some of the older cops he worked with made it seem effortless. How did they do it? He watched them, talked to them, took classes. Eventually, he obtained an advanced degree in psychology. A good interviewer made himself into a great one.

Another wizard, an L.A. Sherriff was frustrated that he continued to have difficulty interviewing certain kinds of suspects and witnesses. They had something in common. But what was it? To find out, he apprenticed himself to one of the country's leading forensic psychiatrists. He now lectures on the role of personality in investigative interviewing.

Among the thousands of college students I have tested, no expert lie detectors were identified. In other research, I found that people under 22 years of age were significantly less accurate in lie detection than people in older age groups. If lie detection is natural, one would not expect mere aging to increase accuracy.

The idea of a "natural" human lie detector seems to bring with it a host of wrong ideas - that such people are "intuitive," or overly emotional, or uneducated.
In truth, however, the truth wizards I have studied are almost all quite logical and thoughtful, emotionally controlled, and highly educated. They include PhDs in literature, business and psychology, MDs, and JDs. The truth wizards are judges, arbitrators, artists, lawyers, therapists, and police investigators. It takes a lot of brain power to entangle the webs that are woven when people attempt to deceive.

What the expert lie detectors have in common is their motivation to understand others and to find the truth. The idea that this should happen with no effort, a mere blossoming of innate ability, boggles the mind. Even in the Harry Potter books, the nascent wizards attend Hogwarts Academy to develop their skills and repeatedly practice and test their already generous gifts. The equivalent of Hogwarts Academy for truth wizards may be the Academy of Life. Most expert lie detectors have had intense exposure to a wide array of humanity - by representing clients ranging from mentally retarded janitors to CEOs, or by working undercover, or by exploring the interstices of the psyche in therapy or in their art. They bring to this exploration a self-discipline and self-reflection that is rare, and certainly not "natural," given the prevalence of the positive illusion bias among most of us.