Are You a Better Liar Than Most?
Back in February this year we brought you a story titled, “Can Biometrics Detect a Lie” As interesting as this article was, we have found a new break in the story. By break we mean lead and this time, research has actually been conducted by the University of London to see whether some people are better liars than others.
Although no research was actually conducted regarding lie detectors or biometrics, which could include increased heart rate or shifting eye patterns (all of which could be quantifiable using certain biometrics) this time good old fashioned observation techniques were used in conjunction with incentives to try and tackle fraud.
In short, the study showed that people who can more accurately tell when they are being lied to, tend to be better liars themselves. Sounds like one hell of a revelation! But actually, previous research on the topic showed the opposite. That people only have a chance of correctly judging when they are being lied to.
The research took a sample of people and asked them to take turns lying and judging when they were being lied to. By doing this type of research, getting the same people to do the same tasks to each other they were able to compare individual players ability. From the research the University of London hopes to be able to understand how exactly certain people are better liars than others because they have found a direct correlation between lying and being lied to.
Perhaps this will stimulate technology which will be able identify deception much more reliably than the standard polygraph, which from the previous post on this topic tends to be around 61% (A 1997 survey of 421 psychologists).
This is quite interesting considering a lot of us are terrible liars or would only be able to get away with the simple white lie. Perhaps all of us could train ourselves to be able to identify a liar based on this research. Although, ironically, according to the University of London, if we can sniff out a lie then we are better liars ourselves. We would certainly then transform into a fraudulent society altogether, oh dear! Are some things better left unsolved then?
