Deception detection from written accounts

[EN]Most research into deception detection in written accounts has been conducted on transcripts instead of written messages, and has focused on identifying valid verbal deception correlates instead of also examining untrained readers’ spontaneous lie-detection attempts (accuracy rates, the cues the...

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Bibliographic Details
Authors: Masip Pallejá, Jaume, Bethencourt, María, Lucas, Guadalupe, Sánchez San-Segundo, Miriam, Herrero Alonso, María Carmen
Format: article
Status:Published version
Publication Date:2011
Country:España
Institution:Universidad de Salamanca (USAL)
Repository:GREDOS. Repositorio Institucional de la Universidad de Salamanca
OAI Identifier:oai:gredos.usal.es:10366/159812
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/10366/159812
Access Level:Open access
Keyword:Deception cues
Deception detection
Lie detection
LIWC
Verbal skills
Description
Summary:[EN]Most research into deception detection in written accounts has been conducted on transcripts instead of written messages, and has focused on identifying valid verbal deception correlates instead of also examining untrained readers’ spontaneous lie-detection attempts (accuracy rates, the cues they use, and so on). Also, the question of whether good liars are also good detectors has not been examined using written accounts. In Study 1, 78 participants handwrote a story and then judged the veracity of another participant’s story. Accuracy was at chance level. Good liars were not better detectors than poor liars, but participants who thought they were good liars also thought they were good detectors. The higher the participants’ fluidity scores on a standardized test, the poorer liars they were and the better liars they thought they were. The cues participants said they used were related to their judgments but unrelated to actual veracity. In Study 2, some Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC) categories (with the Spanish-language dictionary) permitted a 68% classification rate of the written accounts of Study 1.