The Psychology of Deception
Why humans lie about everything
If you’re a human, then I don’t need to tell you that people lie all the time. It’s built into the framework of our social lives. Just try to get through a day without telling a single lie. Go ahead. It’s damn near impossible. And if you tell me you did—well I know you’re lying.
The question is, why do humans lie about everything? First, let’s define what we mean by lying.
What is deception?
- Deception is an active misrepresentation of reality to another conscious mind (Trivers, 2013).
- Deception involves deliberately misleading a person to believe something that is untrue or by concealing true information (Whiten & Byrne, 2002).
- Deception is largely accepted as a widespread feature of communication, although the extent to which it is intentional is debated (Vrij & Granhag, 2012).
Lying is a cognitive ability that evolved primarily for social reasons. As humans, our primary vehicle for social interaction is language. The more complex a communication system is, the more likely it is that the system will be used to misrepresent the truth, both intentionally and unintentionally.
Language is like a bag of tricks for our species, and lying is one of our most…
