How to recognize a lie: by gestures, facial expressions, in communication. How to identify a lie when communicating: different approaches and useful literature A fairy tale is a lie, but there is a hint in it

As you know, lies have long been the constant companion of our modern life... We are faced with untruths in absolutely any area of life: at work, at home, in personal life, in friendship. Perhaps there is not a single area in which only the truth is always and in everything. Have you ever wondered why we tend to cheat?

There are many reasons why people are not telling the truth. However, in most cases, pathological liars are deceiving. What are pathological liars?

The surest sign of truth is simplicity and clarity. Lies are always complex, elaborate and wordy.
Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy

Who is a pathological liar and how do you recognize him?

A pathological liar is a person who is used to deceiving always and in everything. That is, a lie is also necessary for a pathological liar, as.

Unfortunately, there are not so few pathological liars as it seems at first glance. Such people pose a serious danger, since any information they say is fiction. That is why it is so important to learn to "recognize" a pathological liar.

Here are 5 ways to help you learn to distinguish between pathological lies and the liar himself.

Method one: listen to the voice of a liar

You might be surprised to learn that the timbre and intonation of your voice will help you recognize a pathological liar. Everything is very simple: if a person speaks confidently, without hesitation, without choosing his words carefully, most likely they are telling you the truth. If your interlocutor, on the contrary, constantly selects the "necessary" words, is noticeably nervous and slightly stutters - you should think about it: perhaps you are dealing with a pathological deceiver.

Note, however, that in some cases, the signs of lying are similar to worry. For example, the person you are talking to may stutter because of anxiety or fatigue. That is why, in order to be 100% sure that you are being deceived, you need to pay attention to other additional factors.

Pauses

They do not always indicate one hundred percent of deception, but they may mean that the liar needs time to think about the next line of behavior. Too long or frequent hesitation before answering a question, repetition of questions, inappropriate interjections, and sudden vibrations and changes in tone. If a person wants to hide fear or anger, his voice will be louder, and if he wants to hide sadness or resentment, it will lower.

Method two: look into the eyes of a liar

Pay attention to the gaze of your interlocutor.

If a person calmly tells you this or that event and at the same time confidently looks into your eyes, most likely they are not deceiving you. Usually, when a person is telling a lie, his gaze is directed to the side, and doubt can be clearly seen in the eyes.

You may be surprised, but a person's gaze can tell much more than their movements or the timbre of their voice.

Facial expressions

The face is directly connected with the areas of the brain that are responsible for emotionality and only an experienced deceiver will be able to control everything that it wants to give out. Concealment of lies occurs under the guise of any emotion. And most of the time it will be a smile. Such a familiar to everyone, it does not matter if it is used with a duty greeting or hypocritical compliments, while negative emotions are much more difficult to play quickly, without time for preparation. Watch out for micro facial expressions - a fleeting, truthful grimace that will indicate true feelings interlocutor.

Method Three: Confusing the Liar

Ask an unexpected question.

This way of recognizing a pathological liar is considered not only the most effective, but also interesting (from a psychological point of view).

Let's give a simple example: your employee at work tells you another "story", the veracity of which you seriously doubt. Politely ask for forgiveness from your interlocutor and ask a completely unexpected, and at the same time, elementary question. The reaction will tell you if the person was telling you the truth.

"Everybody lies!" - the main phrase in the TV series "House". Paradoxically, these words are perhaps the most truthful in the world. And if so, learning how to recognize a lie does not put anyone away.

Statistics: 80% of people resort to deception at least once a day. Some do not even notice this for themselves - they lie automatically.

Lies are often harmless and sometimes useful. For example, when doctors tell hopelessly ill patients that there is a chance for recovery, or the narrator embellishes his story to make more impressions on the listener. But in many cases, deception is committed for personal gain, and if you do not want to become the object of a lie, it is better to familiarize yourself with its characteristic signs.

How lies are externally manifested

Imagine that you decide to cheat someone. That is, you own certain information, but deliberately transfer it to the interlocutor in a distorted form or even replace it with other data. In this case, everything happens spontaneously. You need to spend energy not to betray the truth and control the flow of deception, so that no one will catch you. Concentrating on this makes it difficult to control facial muscle movements and gestures.

These external signs appear due to an internal feeling of anxiety that you may be opened, as well as due to the way our brain works. Further we will understand everything in more detail.

How to recognize a lie based on external signs

To get started, we recommend that you familiarize yourself with the material about lies on Wikipedia (opens in a new tab). Pay special attention to the types of deception.

Face

By the expression on a person's face, you can understand what kind of emotion he is experiencing. But if you try, then it is also possible to determine a lie by the face.

In our case, special attention should be paid to eyes... Deceivers often look away because it is psychologically difficult to lie to a person, looking into the eyes. When communicating, it is important to pay attention to which side the eyes are averted - it is quite possible that your interlocutor is trying to remember something.

Subconsciously, a liar can “hide” from you. Examples of this are covering the mouth (trying to "hide" words), touching the nose or ears. By the way, such people are constantly trying to keep their hands busy: they pull at clothes, remove specks or twirl something in their hands (spinner, for example 🙂).

A change in complexion can also be a sign that the person is insincere. The deceiver may blush or turn pale.

Speech and Voice

Observing a face and immediately recognizing a lie is a difficult task and requires a certain amount of experience. Therefore, you can start with the fact that you will listen to what your interlocutor says and how he does it.

A common sign of cheating is a repetition of the words in the question. Example: "Did you break the plate?" - "I didn't break your plate!"

It is worth considering if you do not hear direct answers from a potential liar. On the same question about the plate, you may hear something like: "But how could I break it?" In the answer, unnecessary details may appear with a gradual distraction from the subject matter of the question. Experienced liars practice "talking" to the interlocutor, transferring the topic of conversation to another channel.

Broadcasting lies is, in a way, a small test for a person. And due to the excitement in these moments, his voice timbre may change. This also includes problems with the construction of speech. Pronunciation, slips of the tongue, syntax should all be suspicious.

Behavior

Sometimes the cheater will automatically become defensive and uncomfortable with you. When communicating, his attention may switch to something else.

If you want to test the liar, try changing the subject. The interlocutor will willingly support you in this, because there will no longer be a need to waste energy on deception. If, however, return to an unpleasant question for him, then you can observe a sharp change in the behavior of this person.

There are logical inconsistencies and confusion in the explanations of deceivers. On this he can be caught by simply asking leading questions.

Interesting fact! According to researchers, the average man lies 1,092 times a year, while the average woman lies 728 times. At the same time, men regret committed deception only in 70% of cases, when women - in 82%.

Liars love to hide the truth by turning the topic of the conversation into a playful channel. In this case, to our question: "Didn't you break the plate?" you can get the answer: "Huh, flying or what?". Thus, we again do not receive a direct answer, and the topic of the conversation itself is ridiculed and allegedly has become less significant.

When trying to catch a cheater, you may stumble upon a violent emotional reaction. This protection is especially characteristic of girls and women. Example: "Darling, didn't you accidentally spend all the money from my card?" - “You always accuse me of something! What do you think I'm such a spender? " An example is exaggerated, but clear: we again see a transition from the topic of the question to another channel, and besides, the one who asked the question begins to feel guilty.

Books on the psychology of lies

You can study in detail the mechanisms of lies and master the methods of revealing it by reading special books. Authors such as Alan Pease and Paul Ekman, have devoted more than one decade to this issue, having released a number of interesting works. Among them:

The Psychology of Lies (Paul Ekman);
“Recognize a Liar by Their Facial Expression” (Paul Ekman);
The Psychology of Emotions (Paul Ekman);
Body Language (Alan Pease);
“The Language of Man-Woman Relationships” (Alan Pease);
“New body language. Extended version "(Alan Pease).

Interesting video about signs of lying:

Conclusion

Our short educational program on how to recognize a lie is over. It is clear that it is very difficult to notice all the signs at once, and their presence does not always mean that a person is insincere, because he may just worry about something of his own. In any case, with the help of this knowledge and your intuition, you can better protect yourself from hanging noodles.

When a person lies, they try not to look you directly in the eyes, or they often look away. If a person is lying in a conversation with you, then most often he thinks that you evaluate his every word, so such a person tries to look either at the floor or not in your direction. Some liars, on the contrary, try to look straight in the eyes, thinking that in this way all the information they say will seem more believable to you.

Amplification of words in spoken phrases and counter questions

Liars often raise their voices and emphasize specific words in their phrases. "Yes, I have NEVER met this girl in my life!" Thus, liars try to make a person no longer ask new questions, developing this or that topic further. They try to show that they are completely clean in front of you, but more often than not, this technique makes the whole story they tell even more implausible. Another common liar's trick is the counter-question: "Where did you get this information from?" or "who told you that?" Thus, the liar is trying to gain time to come up with an answer to your question, while you yourself will answer his question.

Strange gestures and behavior

Very often, liars try to turn away from the person with whom they are talking, begin to blink often, smile less. Their tone of voice changes slightly. They may cross their arms, thereby trying to "shut themselves off" from you and your questions, or they are constantly holding back something. Sometimes people fidget too often while sitting, for example, in a chair. Of course, this may indicate that the chair they are sitting on is not very comfortable, but more often than not, they thereby show that they feel uncomfortable in a conversation with you. Some people who love to lie touch parts of their faces, rub their earlobes, or scratch their nose, or start playing with their pocket objects: keys, a phone, a pen, or any other object that they have in their hands at that moment.

Superfluous information

Liars very often try to provide additional information on your question, even if you do not ask them to do so. They think that if you make your story more detailed and voluminous, then it will seem more believable to you. But, unfortunately for them, in the end the story becomes more confusing and less truthful. The longer their answer, the more likely it is that it has nothing to do with the truth, or at least partially it.

Defensive position

The person who starts lying to you takes a defensive stance. He will try in every possible way to divert your attention from himself and often begins to get angry even at the seemingly simple and innocent question. People who tell the truth tend to act differently - they take an offensive and proactive stance. They don't start coming up with answers. This becomes apparent when in conversation the person simply tells you that they would like to change the subject of the conversation.

Focus on minor details

If a person is lying, then he tries to focus on insignificant details, thereby trying to distract you and miss important ones. Excessive emphasis on minor details makes the liar feel more comfortable talking to you, but the person who hears the lie will begin to feel that something is wrong here and the opponent is clearly missing important information. In this case, it is very easy to bring a liar to clean water if you write down the details that he talks about, and then ask questions related to these details, and thereby check if he has missed something.

And the eyes are sly

Watch the movement of the eyes of the opponent you are talking to. If a person is trying to remember something (and if he is right-handed), then his gaze will be directed up and to the left. If this person is trying to come up with something, then his gaze will be directed up and to the right. It's the same with left-handers, only in this case the person will remember the truth, looking up and to the right, and compose a lie, looking up and to the left. In addition, people who lie very often blink or rub their eyes. As a rule, liars keep their eyelids closed for a little longer than with normal blinking. Closing your eyelids longer than usual is a sign that the person doesn't like what they hear. In addition, the liar can make hand movements at eye level, which may indicate that he wants to "close" from the truth.

You're sweating!

Some people, by lying, sweat more than usual. However, it should be borne in mind that although increased sweating can really be a marker of whether a person is lying to you or not, you should not take it as a canonical indicator of truth or falsehood. The fact is that some people start to sweat when they are nervous or shy. But the combination of signs of excessive "fluidity", facial flushing and obvious problems in swallowing is already a more appropriate indicator that the person is trying to lie to you.

Micromimics

The most honest emotions, as a rule, appear on a person's face for short moments only at the very beginning of a conversation. It can be a half-smile that lasts for the first five seconds, or an excited look that lasts for about the same amount of time. These micro-expressions of emotions are sometimes noticed literally on a subconscious level and make it possible to correctly determine whether a person is lying or not. Although you may not even understand how you found it out. Many people literally "gut" feel that the person sitting opposite them is lying. Observations of microexpressions usually lead to this conclusion. As a rule, such expressions of emotion occur very quickly, but if you are attentive, you will definitely be able to notice them.

Tell me all over again

Ask the liar to repeat his entire story from the beginning. If the story is fictional, then it will be very difficult for a person to remember all the details that were present in it. You will immediately notice that the person will feel uncomfortable and anxious and will start choosing words.

In most cases, it is very easy to tell if the person is lying to you. Just because you literally feel it, and you also know that this person cannot tell the whole truth one hundred percent. If you start to observe more closely the behavior and movement of a person during a conversation, you will begin to notice much more detail. Initially, you will most likely blame everything on your "gut", but you will soon realize that you have become more observant than you previously thought. By following these basic principles, you can easily not only catch liars, but also become more attentive and observant with the people with whom you are talking.

According to statistics, each person manages to lie at least 4 times a day, since the truth often contradicts generally accepted standards of decency, ethics and even morality. How to recognize a lie if no modern detector is able to give one hundred percent guarantee that what a person said is not a deception? Let's define the external signs of a lie that will give out the interlocutor.

What is not true

Often, deception is harmless when a person tells a lie out of politeness or a desire to please (“You look great!”, “Very glad to meet you!”). Sometimes people have to undermine the whole truth or remain silent in response to uncomfortable questions out of unwillingness to escalate the situation, and this is also considered insincerity.

However, psychologists argue that even a seemingly harmless lie can seriously harm a relationship, especially when it comes to understatement between family members: husband and wife, parents and children. It is difficult to build mutual trust and maintain strong family ties in these circumstances, so it is important to know how to recognize a lie from a man, woman or child.

Observations of specialists in the field of psychology have shown certain results that relate to deception in the family:

despite their outward openness to the interlocutor, extroverts are more prone to lying than introverts;
children quickly learn to lie in authoritarian families, while doing it often and masterly;
parents who are gentle towards a child notice a lie immediately, because he rarely deceives and lies insecurely;
the female sex is prone to deception when it comes to household items - they hide the price of purchased goods, do not talk about a broken cup or burnt dish, etc.
Men are prone to understatement in matters of relationships, they hide their dissatisfaction with a partner, have mistresses and confidently lie about their loyalty.

How do you learn to recognize lies?

To prevent the development of complex family relationships based on deception, infidelity and understatement, it is important to learn to understand sincerity. Often, the ability to bring a deceiver to the surface is a natural talent of a person who intuitively knows how to recognize a lie by facial expressions, gestures or intonation of the interlocutor. It helps him in this. life experience communication with liars, or natural observation.

This does not mean that anyone who wants to be able to identify deception without the appropriate experience or talent. Currently, psychology has established some verbal and non-verbal signs of information distortion, which are typical for most people. Thanks to a well-established methodology based on the understanding of such signals, each person can develop the ability to recognize insincerity. Let's find out what is capable of betraying a liar.