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Who killed my relative? Police officers' ability to detect real-Life high stakes lies
Abstract
The present experiment examined the ability of fifty-two uniformed police officers to detect deception. The experiment differed from previous experiments into detecting deceit because of its high stake lies scenario. The judges were exposed to videotaped press conferences of people who were asking the general public for help in finding their relatives or the murderers of their relatives. They all lied during these press conferences and they all have been found guilty of killing their own relatives. The judges did not perform better than could be expected by chance. Additional analyses showed that accuracy was unrelated to confidence, age, years of job experience in the police force, or level of experience in interviewing suspects. There was, however, a significant positive correlation between having experience in interviewing suspects and being confident in detecting deception. Finally, men were better at detecting deception than women.
... Hence differences across these groups can not be uniquely attributed to experience. More strikingly, only a few studies (e.g., Ekman and O'Sullivan, 1991;Vrij and Mann, 2001) have found that experience matters, most reporting no difference between groups. ...
... This apparent inability to learn could be because existing laboratory studies have not allowed high stakes, feedback, or repeated decisions (e.g., Vrij and Mann, 2001;Elaad, 2003). 2 The question of ecological validity has also been raised (e.g., Gokhmann et al., 2012), given the importance of contextual information in professional decision-making (e.g., Park et al., 2002;Belot and van de Ven, 2017). Our approach is novel as it uses game show data and studies a high-stakes, feedback environment with repeated decisions by individual judges without special training, who face different challengers on every occasion. ...
... Granting that assumption would suggest that those cognitive biases perfectly stifle lying, which is not the case. There are videotaped press conferences of murderers asking the public for assistance in finding their victims (ten Brinke & Porter, 2012; Vrij & Mann, 2001). ...
This article examines the idea that cognitive load interventions can expose lies—because lying is more demanding than truth-telling. I discuss the limitations of that hypothesis by reviewing seven of its justifications. For example, liars must suppress the truth while lying, and this handicap makes lying challenging such that one can exploit the challenge to expose lies. The theoretical fitness of each justification is variable and unknown. Those ambiguities prevent analysts from ascertaining the verisimilitude of the hypothesis. I propose research questions whose answers could assist in specifying the justifications and making cognitive load lie detection amenable to severe testing.
... Generally, those who are asked to detect a lie, 'judges' , perform equally well -or poorly (Bond and DePaulo, 2008). There are hardly any differences in detection skills by age, education and experience (Vrij and Mann, 2001;Levine, 2019). Context and amount of exposure also matters. ...
Aim:
Research on deception detection has usually been executed in experimental settings in the laboratory. In contrast, the present research investigates deception detection by actual victims and near victims of fraud, as reported in their own words.
Materials and methods:
Our study is based on a nationally representative survey of 11 types of (mostly) online fraud victimization (N = 2,864). We used qualitative information from actual victims and near victims on why they didn't fall for the fraud, or how, in hindsight, it could have been prevented.
Results:
The main detection strategies mentioned by near victims (N = 958) were 1) fraud knowledge (69%): these near victims clearly recognized fraud. Other strategies related to fraud knowledge were: noticing mistakes (27.9%), rules and principles about safe conduct (11.7%), and personal knowledge (7.1%). A second type of strategy was distrust (26.1%). A third strategy was 'wise through experience' (1.6%). Finally, a limited number of respondents (7.8%) searched for additional information: they contacted other people (5.5%), sought information online (4%), contacted the fraudster (2.9%), contacted their bank or credit card company (2.2%), or contacted the police (0.2%). Using knowledge as a strategy decreases the probability of victimization by a factor of 0.43. In contrast, all other strategies increased the likelihood of victimization by a factor of 1.6 or more. Strategies generally were uncorrelated, several strategies differed by type of fraud. About 40% of the actual victims (N = 243) believed that their victimization might have been prevented by: 1) seeking information (25.2%), 2) paying more attention (18.9%), 3) a third party doing something (16.2%), 4) following safety rules or principles, like using a safer way of paying or trading (14.4%), or by 5) 'simply not going along with it' (10.8%). Most of these strategies were associated with a higher, not lower, likelihood of victimization.
Conclusion:
Clearly, knowledge of fraud is the best strategy to avoid fraud victimization. Therefore, a more proactive approach is needed to inform the public about fraud and attackers' modus operandi, so that potential victims already have knowledge of fraud upon encountering it. Just providing information online will not suffice to protect online users.
... Research has shown that police officers are not significantly better in lie detection when being compared to lay people (Aamodt & Custer, 2006;DePaulo & Pfeifer, 1986;Ekman & O'Sullvian, 1991). Furthermore, accuracy in lie detection was not related to work experience or experience with interviewing suspects (Vrij & Mann, 2008). In line with these studies, there can be concluded that detecting lies and deception is not something that can be trained. ...
Security officers have the important task to keep public places safe by observing and detecting people with possible hostile intentions. Findings of previous search about this subject are diverse and ambiguous, some researchers have stated people are able to observe and detect deviant behavior, whereas others state that people are no better than chance level in detecting hostile intentions. A recent study from Wijn, Van der Kleij, Kallen, Stekkinger and De Vries (2017) about hostile intentions, however, stated that some conditions could enhance detection levels. The current study will replicate the study from Wijn et al. (2017) to see if cognitive load and environmental cues could improve detection performance. In addition the original study, police officers took part in the experiment, and a comparison with college students is made concerning hostile detection. No main or interaction effects from the different conditions on detection performance were found after performing a 2 x 2 repeated measures ANOVA. Furthermore, there was no difference in detection levels when comparing police officers with college students. However, work experience seemed to be a significant predictor of the detection performance. This current study had different findings from the original study from Wijn et al. (2017). Replication is crucial and in order to get more insight in this field of psychology, future research on this topic is suggested. Does it show when people have hostile intentions? 3
... High-stake lies were used in some previous research. For example, Vrij and Mann (2001) used the videos from media where missing people's family members announced the missing of their family and asked for help. In these videos, some of the announcers were telling the truth, while the others were hiding the truth that the people claimed to be missing were murdered by the announcers themselves. ...
High stakes can be stressful whether one is telling the truth or lying. However, liars can feel extra fear from worrying to be discovered than truth-tellers, and according to the “leakage theory,” the fear is almost impossible to be repressed. Therefore, we assumed that analyzing the facial expression of fear could reveal deceits. Detecting and analyzing the subtle leaked fear facial expressions is a challenging task for laypeople. It is, however, a relatively easy job for computer vision and machine learning. To test the hypothesis, we analyzed video clips from a game show “The moment of truth” by using OpenFace (for outputting the Action Units (AUs) of fear and face landmarks) and WEKA (for classifying the video clips in which the players were lying or telling the truth). The results showed that some algorithms achieved an accuracy of >80% merely using AUs of fear. Besides, the total duration of AU20 of fear was found to be shorter under the lying condition than that from the truth-telling condition. Further analysis found that the reason for a shorter duration in the lying condition was that the time window from peak to offset of AU20 under the lying condition was less than that under the truth-telling condition. The results also showed that facial movements around the eyes were more asymmetrical when people are telling lies. All the results suggested that facial clues can be used to detect deception, and fear could be a cue for distinguishing liars from truth-tellers.
... Studies of lie detection based on videotaped police interviews with persons suspected of serious crimes, later confirmed guilty (e.g., Mann et al., 2008), do not indicate any differences in the suspect's demeanor between when he is telling a straight lie and when he (later) is telling the truth, and the overall hit rate is not much above chance level. Likewise, studies of TV interviews of mourning relatives of victims of serious crimes begging the perpetrator to come forward, some of whom later turned out to have committed the crime (Vrij and Mann, 2001;Baker et al., 2013), show that truthfulness judgments were close to chance level (for a single exception, see Wright Whelan et al., 2014). A study of routine police controls of cars, some of which had a minor crime to conceal, showed no above-chance level detection of the true crimes (Carlucci et al., 2013). ...
Denault, V. (2020). Comment les juges détectent-ils les mensonges ? Étude des mécanismes communicationnels sous-jacents aux déclarations de culpabilité pour parjure [How do judges detect lies? A study of the communication mechanisms underlying perjury convictions] [Doctoral Thesis, Université de Montréal]. Papyrus UdeM. http://hdl.handle.net/1866/24285
This paper reports a replication and extension of the McCornack & Parks model of relational deception detection which argued that the association between relational involvement and accuracy in detecting deception is mediated by judgmental confidence and truth-bias; and that relational involvement, confidence, truth-bias and accuracy form a causal chain. Recent research testing some of these links has yielded results which cast doubt upon the validity of the model. Moreover, research examining suspicion has raised questions concerning the generalizability of the model across various levels of aroused suspicion. The present study represents the first rigorous path-analytic test of the model, as well as a test of the model's generalizability. Testing the model in a sample of ninety romantically involved couples, this study found unqualified support for the model as it was originally specified. In addition, the model seems to be generalizable across levels of aroused suspicion. The implications of the model for research on relationships are discussed.
Adult Eyewitness Testimony: Current Trends and Developments provides an overview of empirical research on eyewitness testimony and identification accuracy, covering both theory and application. The volume is organized to address three important issues. First, what are the cognitive, social and physical factors that influence the accuracy of eyewitness reports? Second, how should lineups be constructed and verbal testimony be taken to improve the chances of obtaining accurate information? And third, whose testimony should be believed? Are there differences between accurate and inaccurate witnesses, and can jurors make such a distinction? Adult Eyewitness Testimony: Current Trends and Developments is crucial reading for memory researchers, as well as police officers, judges, lawyers and other members of the judicial system.
Relatively stable perceptions of truthfulness tend to develop in relationships, although situations may arise causing partners to become suspicious of one another. The truth bias that grows as relationships develop was conceptualized as a cognitive heuristic for judging a partner's veracity. This study of relational partners investigates the influence of the truth bias and aroused suspicion on judgments of truthfulness. Using a 2 × 2 × 2 experimental design, one partner was assigned the role of interviewee who responded either truthfully or deceptively to questions about his or her emotional reactions to a pair of film clips. The other partner was assigned to the role of an interviewer who was either suspicious or not suspicious and made judgments about his or her partner's veracity. Findings were consistent with the truth bias hypothesis. Partners in well-developed relationships demonstrated a strong truth bias, resulting in greater judgments of truthfulness and (somewhat) lower detection accuracy. Suspicion aroused by a third party served to offset this heuristic and lead to greater judgments of deceptiveness. The implications of these findings for research on social cognition and deceptive communication are discussed.
Previous research suggests that liars are not aware that they tend to decrease their movements during deception. Moreover, it is unclear how liars will behave if someone informs them about their behavioral rigidity during deception, and to what extent several processes (tension, attempted behavioral control, and cognitive effort) are associated with deception. In the present experiment, subjects were interviewed twice. During one interview, they told the truth, and during the other interview, they lied. In the information-present condition, before both interviews, subjects were told that deception is usually associated with a decrease in movements. In the information-absent condition, no information was given. The results revealed that whereas subjects believed that they increased their movements during deception, a decrease in movements, in fact, occurred. Provision of information about deceptive behavior had no effect. The results also showed that a decrease in movements was associated with attempted control and cognitive load processes, and occurred independently from the tension experienced by deceivers.
This experiment compared the deception detection skills of conversational participants and observers. Participants were expected to have a more pronounced truth‐bias than observers. They were also predicted to be less accurate detecting deception than observers because of the cognitive and communication requirements of conversational management. Each of fifty observers viewed two videotaped interactions between an interviewer (i.e., conversational participant) and two interviewees (i.e., sources) who either told the truth or deceived. Conversational participants attributed more truth to sources than did observers and they were less accurate detectors than observers. When not told about the deception manipulation, observers relied on more accurate behavioral cues than participants. When informed about deception, participants relied on inaccurate facial cues, whereas observers relied on inaccurate vocal cues to judge deceit.
The role of on-the-job experience in fostering skill at detecting deception was examined. A deception-detection test was administered to three samples of more than 100 subjects each: a group of undergraduates with no special experiences at detecting deceit; a group of new recruits to a federal law enforcement training program, who had some limited on-the-job experience at detecting deceit; and a group of advanced federal law enforcement officers, with years of experience working at jobs in which the detection of deception is very important. Although the officer samples were more confident about their judgments of deceptiveness than were the students, they were no more accurate than the students. None of the three groups showed a significant improvement in deception-detection success from the first half to the second half of the test; however, the advanced officers felt increasingly confident about their performance as they progressed through the test. Correlational analyses of the relationship between accuracy and confidence provided further evidence that experience does not improve people's awareness oi the accuracy or inaccuracy of their judgments. The findings from this research are compared to the results of research on other kinds of professional decision-makers (e.g., clinical psychologists), and several theoretical perspectives on the role of experience in decision making are discussed.
All deception studies published to date have been laboratory studies. In such studies people lied only for the sake of the experiment, consequently the stakes were usually low. Although research has shown that most spontaneous lies told in real life are trivial, such studies tell us little about lies where the stakes are high (such as police/suspect interviews). In Study 1, we discuss the behaviour of an actual suspect while he was interviewed by the police in a murder case. Although the man initially denied knowing and killing the victim, substantial evidence obtained by the police showed that he was lying. On the basis of this evidence, the man confessed to killing the victim and was later convicted for murder. To our knowledge there has been no other study published that has analysed the behaviour of a liar in such a high-stake realistic setting. The analysis revealed several cues to deception. In Study 2, we exposed 65 police officers to six fragments (three truthful and three deceptive) of the interview with the murderer and asked them to indicate after each fragment whether the man was lying or not. The findings revealed that the participants were better at detecting truths (70% accuracy) than lies (57% accuracy). We also found individual differences among observers, with those holding popular stereotypical views on deceptive behaviour, such as ‘liars look away’ and ‘liars fidget’ performing least effectively as lie catchers. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Lying and lie detection are the two components that, together, make up the exchange called as the “communication of deception.” Deception is an act that is intended to foster in another person a belief or understanding that the deceiver considers false. This chapter presents a primarily psychological point of view and a relatively microanalysis of the verbal and nonverbal exchange between the deceiver and the lie detector. The chapter discusses the definition of deception. It describes the deceiver's perspective in lie-detection, including the strategies of deception and behaviors associated with lie-telling. The lie-detector's perspective is also discussed in the chapter, and it has described behaviors associated with the judgments of deception and strategies of lie detection. The chapter discusses the outcomes of the deceptive communication process—that is, the accuracy of lie detection—and explores methodological issues, channel effects in the detection of deception, and other factors affecting the accuracy of lie detection.
Research suggests that most people cannot tell from demeanor when others are lying. Such poor performance is typical not only of laypeople but also of most professionals concerned with lying. In this study, three professional groups with special interest or skill in deception, two law-enforcement groups and a select group of clinical psychologists, obtained high accuracy in judging videotapes of people who were lying or telling the truth about their opinions. These findings strengthen earlier evidence that some professional lie catchers are highly accurate, and that behavioral clues to lying are detectable in real time. This study also provides the first evidence that some psychologists can achieve high accuracy in catching lies.