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The Book of Tells (Peter Collett)[unlocked]

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THE BOOK OF TELLS<br />

• DISCLAIMERS. Liars are more likely to use disclaimers<br />

such as 'You won't believe this', 'I know this sounds<br />

strange, but' and 'Let me assure you'. Disclaimers like<br />

these are designed to acknowledge any suspicion the<br />

other person may feel in order to discount it.<br />

• FORMALITY. When people are telling the truth in an<br />

informal situation they are more likely to use an elided<br />

form - for example, to say 'don't' instead <strong>of</strong> 'do not'.<br />

Someone who is telling a lie in the same situation is more<br />

likely to say 'do not' instead <strong>of</strong> 'don't'. That's because<br />

people become more tense and formal when they lie.<br />

• TENSE. Without realizing it, liars have a tendency to<br />

increase the psychological distance between themselves<br />

and the event they're describing. As we have seen, one<br />

way they do this is by their choice <strong>of</strong> words. Another is<br />

by using the past tense rather than the present tense.<br />

• SPEED. Telling a lie requires a lot <strong>of</strong> mental work<br />

because, in addition to constructing a credible line, the<br />

liar needs to keep the truth separated from the lie. This<br />

places demands on the capacities <strong>of</strong> the liar, which in<br />

turn can slow him down. That's why people pause before<br />

producing a lie, and why lies tend to be delivered at a<br />

slower pace than the truth - unless, <strong>of</strong> course, the lie has<br />

been carefully rehearsed, in which case there should be<br />

no difference in speed.<br />

• PAUSES. Liars also produce more pauses between their<br />

words and sentences, and some <strong>of</strong> these pauses are filled<br />

with speech disfluencies like 'urn' and 'er'. <strong>The</strong> cognitive<br />

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