Psychology of Lying Flashcards
People are either liars or they aren’t.
You cannot separate people into two categories: the people who lie, and the people who don’t, due to bias, because everyone lies
Lying doesn’t have any social benefit or justification
When people lie, they justify it by thinking they are protecting the target of the lie or themselves, thinking that they would feel worse if the truth is told. In this way lying is a form of prosocial behavior.
People who lie are immoral
Lying isn’t a moral issue that exists all on it’s own that we could easily condemn, we care about honesty but we also care about love, and happiness, and not doing things that are uncomfortable and painful, and we have to weigh all of this together. Complete honesty doesn’t always win over these other concerns. Acknowledging that people’s intentions are more important than their actions can give us the moral high ground. Love and honesty don’t always coincide.
Lying is being mean and manipulative
From a liar’s point of view, you could be being nice and altruistic
Lying is an odd behaviour, I wonder where it came from
Everything we do, we evolved to be this way, certain traits stick around for a reason
How is language related to lying?
No other animal is capable of such a broad range of lies as we are, because we can verbalize, and speak language, the average adult can speak 10,000 words, words that can be combined in countless ways to lie
My friend lied to me about something serious, why?
People are more likely to tell larger lies to their close ones, and less likely to tell small lies
Do people lie a lot for themselves?
people are more likely to tell self-serving lies than other oriented lies, and they are likely to tell strangers self-serving lies and their close ones protective other oriented lies
When people lie, they lie to manipulate you or exploit you
Most common lies aren’t to manipulate or exploit people, but to boost self-esteem, protect people’s feelings, or to get people to like us
What is lying?
Lying is acting in a way to create a false belief in the victim
What happens when you lie to yourself?
When you lie to yourself one part of your brain is keeping information from the other part of your brain
We have a bias to believe that what other people tell us is generally true. Why?
Because back when our brains were simpler and our habitats were more threatening, if we were stepping through tall grass and heard a noise similar to a snake, but were unsure, it was better for us to believe it’s a snake and get to safety, than not to believe it.
Is there a way we can prevent lying?
There’s the same experiment where people made promises to not lie and to be honest, and this increased their honesty. When your conscious minds weighs instead of your unconscious mine which drives a lot of poor behavior, it’s enough to cause a shift in behavior.
What do white lies do?
Help keep social interactions smooth.
What are the statistics of deception in marriage?
About 1 in 10 marital interactions involve deception.
