Assessing Deception Detection Accuracy with Dichotomous Truth-lie Judgments and Continuous Scaling: Are People Really More Accurate When Honesty is Scaled?

• In Event: Flawed Processing: Inaccuracy, Irrationality and Delusional Processes in Social Cognition

Abstract

Deception detection experiments consistently find that people are slightly better than chance at distinguishing truths from lies. Interpersonal Deception Theory, however, claims that people can accurately detect deception when assessed with continuous scaling. This experiment (N = 140) tested whether measurement impacts accuracy. Results suggest that the difference is largely illusory and attributable to differential variances in measures. Both methods yield similar conclusions including slightly better than chance accuracy, truth bias, and a veracity effect.

Authors

• Timothy Levine, Michigan State University

• Allison Shaw, Michigan State University

• Hillary Shulman, Michigan State University