Detection of Deception in High-Stakes Liars

High-stakes lies occur where there are large positive consequences of getting away with the lie or large negative consequences of getting caught. Because the outcome of the lie is of considerable concern to the liar, it follows that he or she will probably experience more guilt and/or detection anxiety than when telling lowstakes lies. In addition, the liar will probably try particularly hard in such situations to avoid getting caught. This increased effort will be cognitively demanding, and therefore liars probably experience more cognitive load when telling high-stakes lies than when telling lowstakes lies. Accordingly, scholars believe that detecting high-stakes lies should be easier than detecting lowstakes lies. Most lies told in daily life are of the lowstakes variety; these lies are easier to replicate and hence are most commonly researched in laboratory situations. Studies of high-stakes liars have revealed, however, that their behavior is similar to that of low-stakes liars insofar as it typically reveals signs of increased cognitive load and behavioral control. Observers can make use of such signs of increased cognitive load when attempting to detect these high-stakes lies.

For practical reasons, most deception detection research has focused on low-stakes lies; a participant will be asked to lie about a fairly trivial matter for the sake of the experiment. The stakes may be raised slightly, by informing the participant either that his or her behavior will be scrutinized for sincerity by an observer or that being a good liar is an important indicator of being successful in a future career (many careers require the ability to hide one's true feelings or intentions). Sometimes participants are motivated by the offer of a reward for a convincing performance.

Laboratory experiments, however, cannot ethically re-create a high-stakes lie scenario. It is true that the majority of lies told by most people are low-stakes, trivial, day-to-day lies. However, what of the suspects in police interviews, smugglers at airports, speechdelivering corrupt politicians, and adulterous spouses? Some have attempted to create examples of such lies by raising the stakes further in laboratory studies—for example, by giving participants the opportunity to “steal” U.S.$50 and allowing them to keep the money if they are able to convince experimenters. Moreover, some participants have faced an additional punishment if found to be lying—for example, sitting in a cramped, dark room listening to blasts of white noise. Studies such as these raise ethical concerns and yet still fail to compete with the stakes in many real-life situations.

Another way to examine the behavior of the highstakes liar is to look at instances where people have been caught on video telling lies and truths in real life. Such field research is more difficult than laboratory studies in that in real life it can be difficult to establish the ground truth. Therefore, it is imperative that it be known for sure when the communicator is telling the truth and when he or she is lying. In some situations, researchers have looked at suspects in their videotaped police interviews; then, through reviewing case files containing solid evidence (forensic evidence, reliable witness statements, etc.), elements of suspect interviews were established where it was known that the suspects had told the truth or lied. Treated in this fashion, similar clips can be examined for behavioral information and shown to observers to see if they are able to detect such lies.

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