Top 5 Facts About Lying

We hate to break it to you, but our beloved Pinocchio is not all he’s cracked up to be. A 2015 study published in the Journal of Experimental Child Psychology revealed that kids are more likely to be truthful when punishment is removed from the equation. Similarly, researchers have also shown that stories where dishonesty results in negative consequences for the liar are also not an effective deterrent. Thanks a lot, “Boy who Cried Wolf,” and “Pinocchio.” If you want to keep kids honest, best tell them a story about kids who are rewarded for being honest. Lying is actually an important part of a child’s development though, as psychologists say it basically helps them understand that other people have an internal life of their own.

Dan Ariely, a professor of psychology and behavioural economics at Duke University, has long studied people’s deceitful ways using what he calls “The Matrix Experiment.“ And here’s how it works: subjects are given a very limited amount of time to answer a set of 20 math questions and receive one dollar for each correct answer they report. Keyword: report. Nobody checks their answers, and their quizzes are shredded immediately. Ultimately, “The Matrix Experiment” revealed that 70 percent of the 40,000 participants lied about their number of correct answers. But when some distance was placed between the lie and the results by having the test subjects collect tokens and then exchange those token for money, the prevalence of lying doubled. This is kind of troubling when you consider how many financial transactions involve virtual representations of money and not cold hard cash.

Overall, the subjects of “The Matrix Experiment” lied for personal gain, yet the researchers also found that that social norms play a factor.When it’s clear that someone cheated but received no punishment, cheating becomes much more prevalent. Ariely’s team was then curious what would happen if the cheater was perceived as an outsider. After this perceived outsider emerged and blatantly lied, people suddenly became more honest. Meaning, the students took a moral stance and distanced themselves from the deceitful other. And so, the university subjects essentially bonded together in truth rather than fueling a collective and accepted lie.

Regardless of learned values and personal ideals, humans alter their behavior when confronted with moral reminders.
In a variation of the matrix experiment, Ariely learned that people were less inclined to cheat when reminded of a familiar religious concept: The Ten Commandments. Just the idea alone reminded of them of right and wrong, and put an end to cheating, regardless of students’ religious beliefs. Ariely would further discover at some Ivy League institutions that reminding students that they are bound by the school’s honor code produced similar results– even when no such honor code existed! Other experiments have shown that subjects are more honest when they see either their own reflection or a picture of someone looking at them. As little as a pair of cartoon eyes can do the trick!

Brain scans have shown how when we lie, there is a dramatic response in areas dealing with emotions. However, lie after lie, fib after fib, much of this measurable activity dissipates. Another region of the brain that is activated while lying is the prefrontal cortex, which enables people to feel remorse and learn right from wrong. Using MRI machines, in 2005 researchers from the University of Southern California discovered significant differences between the physical composition of the prefrontal cortex in pathological liars and in the average person. Essentially, pathological liars have better networking in that region which helps them not only lie more effectively, but be less affected emotionally when they do.

So, what’s the biggest lie you’ve ever told? And how do you think you’d answer in that “matrix experiment?” For more honest-to-goodness top 10s and “yeah, that’s the ticket” Top 5s, be sure to subscribe to WatchMojo.com.