Chapter
12
Body of Evidence
In This Chapter
• The truth about lies
• Tricks of the trade
• Deception detectives in action
In previous chapters, you learned that there’s no single way to tell if a person is lying. Our bodies do give us away, but it takes a whole, well … body of evidence to do so. In this chapter, you learn what the experts look for when they’re trying to determine whether someone is lying.
The ability to detect deception will give you a strategic advantage in negotiations, employee interviews, business relationships, trials, investigations, and everyday life.
These time-tested tips have been used to train law enforcement officers, military intelligence, private investigators, social workers, polygraph examiners, judges, and psychologists.
There are no half-truths or concealment here. We’re giving you the real deal as taught by some of the best minds in the business, including Dr. Paul Ekman, the real-life psychologist we’ve referred to in Part 1, portrayed as Dr. Cal Lightman on the Fox television series Lie to Me.
Dr. Ekman defines lies as the intention to deliberately mislead, without prior notification of this purpose and without having been explicitly asked to do so by the target. He says there are two primary ways to lie: concealment and falsification. In concealing, the liar withholds information without actually saying anything untrue. In falsifying, the liar withholds true information and presents false information as if it were true.
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That’s the view from 30,000 feet, but not all lies are alike. As a deception detective in training, you need to know how different kinds of lies “look” down here at street level. Generally speaking, the bigger the lie, and the more the liar has to lose, the harder it is to avoid detection. There are some interesting exceptions, as you will read, but as a general guideline, this rule holds true. Let’s start with an easy one.
High-Stakes Lies
High-stakes lies bear serious exposure consequences—financial, physical, or emotional—from loss of a job or a marriage, all the way up to death row. Think of Bernie Madoff or the late President Richard Nixon.
When a high-stakes liar deviates from the truth, it takes mental energy both to maintain the mechanics of the illusion—keeping their story straight—and to avoid detection. Despite their best efforts, however, the deceptive indicators of a high-stakes liar are so strong that it is almost impossible to conceal them from a trained eye. If our sense of smell was more highly developed, we could probably smell a liar from a mile away.
“You look fine.” “It’s so good to see you!” “Let’s do lunch.” “I’m well.” These are examples of everyday lies, and they are almost impossible to detect because there’s nothing to lose or gain in telling the truth.
Self-Deception
Self-deception occurs when the deceiver is unaware they’re deceiving themselves, or does not understand the motive for deceiving themselves. This is most often seen in dating relationships, in career ambitions, and on American Idol.
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Concealment
A lie in sheep’s clothing, a concealed truth is deceit by omission. Deceptive concealment occurs when you choose not to reveal something upon direct questioning or fail to proactively disclose information you are contractually obligated to reveal through, say, an employee ethics policy, oath of office, or code of conduct.
For example, if you witness a co-worker stealing company property, and don’t follow company policy requiring you to report the theft, that is deceitful concealment. Similarly, if your best friend asks whether her boyfriend has been unfaithful, and you know he has, failing to tell her is deceptive.
Knowing your friend’s boyfriend is cheating, and keeping it to yourself until she asks, is not technically a lie, in that you have neither been asked nor are you under any contractual obligation to disclose. However, if you don’t tell her, you may want to examine the meaning of your friendship.
Most liars prefer to conceal, rather than fabricate, because fabrication requires having to remember the false story. If they have to fabricate, more often than not, they’ll mix truths with lies to give their deception a more pleasing and believable appearance, like hiding poison in an apple.
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Tricks of the Trade
Remember from Chapter 1, we covered the steps about reading a person’s body language. Now it’s time to put those skills to work in detecting deception. Here’s a refresher on those steps:
1. Establish rapport: Face-to-face or over the phone, a three- to five-minute warm-up should break the ice.
2. Mirror speech and behavior: Match your words and mannerisms loosely with the person you are observing. Look for signs they are in sync with you.
3. Norming: Observe the person you are studying carefully during these first few minutes of casual conversation. Make note of any nervous quirks or unusual mannerisms to avoid misinterpreting them later during more direct questioning.
4. Find their baseline: These are behaviors you observed during the norming phase, as you were building rapport.
5. Compare and contrast: During questioning, observe and record changes from the baseline.
Remember, you are looking for inconsistencies. There’s no one Pinocchio response, no growing liar’s nose, but there are lots of ways liars telegraph their deception. When someone is trying to deceive you, you’ll notice one or more of the following:
• Facial expressions that don’t match words
• Body language that doesn’t match voice
• Tone of voice that doesn’t match words
• Any variation thereof
In deception detection, we have a term for these verbal and nonverbal anomalies: “hot spots.”
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Deceptive Demeanor
Having discovered some valuable items missing from your home, you ask your cleaning person whether she knows anything about it.
Having observed her on several occasions, you notice several changes in her demeanor. Her facial expressions seem anxious and fidgety, but her body movements suggest just the opposite. Normally animated, she typically uses a lot of hand gestures. Today, her hands are still. In fact, her whole body seems overly calm, and her speech patterns are overly solicitous and polite.
You can’t say, for certain, that she took the items, but from your observations, it is clear that she is concealing something and that it is leaking out through her body language.
In the workplace, if the boss were to say, “Everything’s fine; the company is financially strong,” and then take his hand and run it along the inside rim of his shirt collar, you might want to update your résumé.
Running a hand along the collar indicates discomfort and deception.
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Here are some other deception clues and what they mean:
• Eye locks are used when trying to convince rather than convey, and/or for intimidation. Other eye clues include excessive blinking (anxiety) and prolonged closure (deceit).
• Body angling away from you suggests a desire to run away or escape an uncomfortable situation.
Angling the body away shows you want to get away from the situation.
• Micro-shoulder shrugs, the body language equivalent of crossed fingers, cancel out words spoken. For example, if a defendant says “I’m innocent,” watch for a micro-shoulder shrug on one side of the body or the other, which would suggest just the opposite.
• Anxiety manifests as grooming gestures, adjusting clothing, touching the hair, and rubbing hands or thumbs.
• Inappropriate laughs or smiles are signs of anxiety.
• Hands over the face suggest hiding, or, if a finger is placed over the mouth, a physical reminder to withhold information.
Covering the face suggests withholding information or hiding.
• Barriers are crossing arms or placing an object between yourself and another.
Other clues might include:
• Slumping
• Eye pulling
Eye pulling is a deceptive and boastful gesture.
• Action stance is where the hands are braced on the arms of the chair, and one foot is in front of the other in a running stance that means, “I’m out of here!”
• Rapid posture changes
This running stance shows you’re ready to get away from the situation.
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Lack of Illustrators
In Chapters 7 and 8 you learned that illustrators are gestures that add to or fill in the blanks during a conversation. When it comes to spotting lies, a person who generally gestures during conversation, but suddenly stops displaying hand and arm gestures during a specific point in the conversation, might be giving a clue that should be noted and documented to determine the underlying reason.
For example, if your friend Alberto, an Italian from Rome, shares a story about his trip to Kilimanjaro, you would see him gesture with his hands and arms as he describes the adventurous trip. When asked a specific question of where in Kilimanjaro he was, you might notice his hand and arm gestures freeze momentarily. Gotcha!
Duping Delight
There are those who get satisfaction from deceiving others. When they feel they have duped you, and think you fell for it, there is a sense of arousal or delight. This duping delight is often accompanied by an inappropriate or awkward smile.
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A good example of this would be former Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky, who smiled his way eerily through a tough interview with television commentator Bob Costas, regarding allegations that Sandusky had molested children. Like crocodile tears, beware of a crocodile smile, smirk, or giggle that seems out of context. That’s another gotcha!
Inappropriate smiles are an indicator of duping delight.
Although not always practical, you might consider creating your own abbreviations to document behavior clues, particularly when interviewing job candidates or anytime you have several people you must observe.
The most important thing to remember when doing this is to match up behavior changes with content. For example, when interviewing a new candidate for hire, notice the way they’re sitting in the chair, in what direction they’re crossing their legs, if they are still or fidgety, and their speech. Look for shifts or changes in behavior.
If the candidate sits with their legs crossed left to right, holding both hands in their lap, and speaking fluidly, this would be their baseline.
During the interview, you notice a gap in their résumé, and politely ask for clarification of employment history between 2010 and 2012. At this time, the prospective employee uncrosses their legs and leans back, crossing their arms. You document the behavior changes on your interviewing pad and next to them write down the dates and content in question.
This will help you pinpoint the hot spots in the résumé. There may a very good reason, such as maternity leave, family illness, or a layoff to explain the gap.
Use the following chart to help you document behaviors. It will help you use abbreviations, rather than writing full words that the employee might pick up on. Feel free to use these abbreviations or create your own.
• Bgr = Breaking gaze to right
• Xarms = Crossing arms
• Xlgs = Crossing legs
• Lcr = Legs crossed right
• Ct = Clearing throat
• Db = Deep breath
• F = Fidgety
• Dete = Direct eye contact
• … = Delayed response
• Gb = Grooming behavior
• Ill = Illustrators
• Lgh = Laugh
• ! = No
• +! = Yes
• Rtg = Repeating the question
• Sn = Scratch neck
• Sic = Shift in chair
• X … + = Stop and start verbal behavior
• Sd = Strong denial
• Hil = Hands in lap
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• Lies are falsification or concealment. Deception without the expectation of truth, such as magic or poker, is not a lie. Also, if someone believes their own lies, such as a pathological liar, they are not technically lying, because they believe what they say is the truth.
• The bigger the lie, the easier it is to detect.
• Deception detection is documenting exceptions or measuring deviations from observed normal behavior.
• Establish a baseline for comparing and contrasting behaviors before drawing any conclusions about deception.