Emotions

Emotions Experienced When Lying

According to Paul Ekman, who is well known for his separate lines of research on emotions and on lying, emotions play a role in lying in one of two ways. First, individuals sometimes lie to conceal their true emotions. However, lying to prevent another person from having his or her feelings hurt is also common, leading other researchers to distinguish two main types of lying: self-centered lies and other-oriented lies.

Self-centered lies are told to protect or bolster the liar's status. For example, in the context of emotions, individuals lie to avoid feelings of embarrassment, to regulate their feelings, to avoid having their feelings hurt, or to avoid feelings of negative affect, such as worry or conflict. [Page 331]An individual may also lie about his or her current emotional state because he or she wishes to maintain a certain level of privacy. Other-oriented lies, in contrast, serve to protect or enhance other people. For instance, individuals will lie to protect another individual's feelings or to prevent feelings of negative affect, such as worry or conflict. Telling other-oriented lies (also known as white lies) is usually required to enhance and maintain close relationships.

Second, Ekman contends that regardless of the emotional content of the lie, liars generally experience specific emotions if their lie has high rather than low stakes. Stakes are higher if the liar fears getting caught in the lie; the liar possesses similar values to the individual that he or she is deceiving, causing the liar to feel guilty; or others bear witness to the liar deceiving another person, which can yield feelings of excitement. Inadvertent emotional cues that could reveal the lie (also known as leakage) are more likely to be displayed when the stakes are high, rather than low, because the liar will usually feel more intense emotions. In these situations, such nonverbal cues are likely to be more noticeable because the liar typically experiences negative affect, which in turn yields withdrawal behaviors. For example, if feeling guilty or ashamed, liars may be less likely to look the listener directly in the eyes. Furthermore, both fear and excitement can lead to higher levels of arousal, which can increase speech errors, stutters, hesitations, and voice pitch. Additionally, when a liar is excited, he or she is likely to display an increase in body movements and smiling.

Stress and Lying

Lying is also a stress-inducing behavior because of emotions, specifically feelings of guilt about being dishonest and feelings of fear about being detected. When a liar feels guilty and the amount of guilt experienced is high, he or she will have difficulty concealing cues that he or she is lying. Moreover, feelings of guilt can often motivate an individual to confess in order to alleviate the negative emotion. Greater fear of being detected occurs when the recipient is perceived to be skilled at lie detection, rather than perceived as gullible. In contrast, greater excitement likely accompanies successful deception of a skilled versus unskilled lie detector. This feeling of excitement has been termed “duping delight,” and it includes feelings of excitement in either the anticipation of telling the lie or the act of lying itself, followed by a feeling of pleasure, a sense of relief, pride for successful deception, and even disdain toward the recipient. When duping delight is extreme, behavioral cues may become apparent to others, indicating that deception is occurring.

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