The 4 Types of Liars You’ll Meet in Your Life

Not all dishonesty is the same. Know who you’re dealing with.

There are various ways of classifying lies: by their consequences, by the importance of their subject matters, by the speakers’ motives, and by the nature or context of the utterance.

Perhaps the most useful way to classify lies is by to the people who tell them. Understanding lies and liars can help us avoid getting duped as well as protect us from drifting into dishonesty ourselves.

Classifying the Types of Liars

The diagram below is a taxonomy of liars, based on plotting their lies along two axes: their intended audiences (x-axis) and their subject matters (y-axis).

People can lie to two kinds of audiences: other people or themselves, and they can lie about two different kinds of things: facts (or what they believe to be facts) and their values.

We all know what it looks like when people lie about facts, but how does one lie about their values? What are values, anyway?