One of the reasons that people perform poorly when trying to detect deception is the difficulty of integrating multiple cues into a binary judgement. A simple heuristic of only judging the level of detail in the message consistently allowed people to discriminate lies from truths.
This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution
Access options
Access Nature and 54 other Nature Portfolio journals
Get Nature+, our best-value online-access subscription
$29.99 / 30 days
cancel any time
Subscribe to this journal
Receive 12 digital issues and online access to articles
$119.00 per year
only $9.92 per issue
Buy this article
- Purchase on Springer Link
- Instant access to full article PDF
Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout
References
Bond, C. F. & DePaulo, B. M. Accuracy of deception judgments. Pers. Soc. Psychol. Rev. 10, 214–234 (2006). A review showing how people, including professionals such as police agents, struggle to tell lies from truth.
Luke, T. J. Lessons from Pinocchio: cues to deception may be highly exaggerated. Perspect. Psychol. Sci. 14, 646–671 (2019). This paper critically examines the empirical evidence for cues to deception, arguing that poor research practices have led to inflated effect-size estimates and that only detailedness shows promise as a deception cue.
DePaulo, B. M. et al. Cues to deception. Psychol. Bull. 129, 74–118 (2003). This meta-analysis shows that most cues to deception are weak.
Gigerenzer, G. & Gaissmaier, W. Heuristic decision making. Annu. Rev. Psychol. 62, 451–482 (2011). A review that explains whether and when relying on heuristics can lead to good decisions.
Additional information
Publisher’s note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
This is a summary of: Verschuere, B. et al. The use-the-best heuristic facilitates deception detection. Nat. Hum. Behav. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-023-01556-2 (2023).
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
A simple heuristic for distinguishing lie from truth. Nat Hum Behav 7, 674–675 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-023-01571-3
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-023-01571-3
