In a new study, researchers have identified a strong sign of fibbing: mimicking the body language of the person they’re lying to. “A liar and a copycat,” the title of the new study now published in the Royal Society’s Open Science journal, could later lead to applications of the theory in criminal justice, New Scientist reported on Friday.
“Liars often deliberately change their behavior into a way they think truth-tellers behave, but this particular copycat behavior is something they wouldn’t even try to manipulate because they don’t realize they’re doing it,” said Sophie Van Der Zee, researcher at Erasmus University Rotterdam in the Netherlands. “That could make it an interesting cue for detecting deceit,” she told New Scientist.
On observation, researchers found that the liars tended to mirror the body language of the person with whom they spoke about the puzzle, whereas honest participants moved differently from their conversational counterpart. Van Der Zee believes the mental load of lying might be too much for our brains, which resort to copycat behavior while the intellectual mind is focused on crafting their deception. Unfortunately, these subtle changes can be difficult to notice without laboratory tools.
Link:NY Post