uva-dare (digital academic repository) disentangling ... · communicationn and deception, proposed...

UvA-DARE is a service provided by the library of the University of Amsterdam (http://dare.uva.nl)

UvA-DARE (Digital Academic Repository)

Disentangling deceptive communication : situation and person characteristics as determinantsof lying in everyday life

Backbier, E.H.F.

Link to publication

Citation for published version (APA):Backbier, E. H. F. (2001). Disentangling deceptive communication : situation and person characteristics asdeterminants of lying in everyday life. Amsterdam: Thela Thesis.

General rightsIt is not permitted to download or to forward/distribute the text or part of it without the consent of the author(s) and/or copyright holder(s),other than for strictly personal, individual use, unless the work is under an open content license (like Creative Commons).

Disclaimer/Complaints regulationsIf you believe that digital publication of certain material infringes any of your rights or (privacy) interests, please let the Library know, statingyour reasons. In case of a legitimate complaint, the Library will make the material inaccessible and/or remove it from the website. Please Askthe Library: https://uba.uva.nl/en/contact, or a letter to: Library of the University of Amsterdam, Secretariat, Singel 425, 1012 WP Amsterdam,The Netherlands. You will be contacted as soon as possible.

Download date: 19 May 2020

https://dare.uva.nl/personal/pure/en/publications/disentangling-deceptive-communication--situation-and-person-characteristics-as-determinants-of-lying-in-everyday-life(1cb791d7-7518-4e69-abb9-900742ed000f).html

Situationn Characteristics and

Answeringg Strategies:

Askk Questions and be Told Lies

Iff deceptive communication is regarded as a means towards an end, as Miller and Stiff

(1993)) suggest, a question that quickly comes to mind is: when is deceptive

communicationn used? Thus instead of asking a more generally addressed question like

"Whichh persons tend to lie?", the focus shifts to the communication strategy itself and the

circumstancess in which it is deemed effective in achieving a certain communicative goal.

Althoughh the notion that situations evoke lie-telling and deception is more widely

recognizedd (e.g. Buller & Burgoon, 1994; Burgoon, Callister & Hunsaker, 1994; Ebesu &

Miller,, 1994; Millar & Tesser, 1989; Saxe, 1991), we do not know of research that has

studiedd the interplay between systematically varied situation characteristics and

spontaneouss (deceptive) communication acts. We therefore still have a very flawed

understandingg of whether, how, and for what part people's communicative actions are

shapedd by the circumstances in which these actions are used. In addition this inhibits our

abilityy to more fully understand the function of deceptive communication in everyday

interpersonall interactions.

69 9

ChapterChapter 6

WhatWhat Is Deceptive Communication?

Bullerr and Burgoon (1994), two leading researchers in the field of interpersonal

communicationn and deception, proposed that deceptive communication is part of a

communicator'ss strategic repertoire of message forms. They thus suggest that deceptive

communicationn is an interpersonal communication strategy, a view that we share with

otherr deception researchers like Miller and Stiff (1993) and Robinson (1996). What's

more,, we also share the perspective of Miller and Stiff (1993) that deceptive

communicationn could be regarded best as a means towards an end. Miller conceptualised

deceptivee communication as persuasion and therefore proposed it as a general persuasive

strategyy that aims at influencing the beliefs, attitudes, and behaviours of others by means of

deliberatee message distortion (Miller, 1983 in Miller & Stiff, 1993, p. 28).

Thee ways in which messages can be distorted in order to deceive an interaction

partner,, roughly can be reduced to five types of strategies: lies or falsifications,

exaggerations,, half-truths, concealments or omissions, and misdirections or diversions.

Bullerr and Burgoon (1994) arrived at this typology after reviewing an array of studies

eitherr aimed at identifying the various dimensions underlying different deception types or

att identifying the various ways in which people tend to depart from the truth.

HowHow Can Situations Evoke Deceptive Communication Acts?

Itt seems that in many situations telling the truth will lead to the intended course and/or

outcomee of an interpersonal encounter and therefore it can probably be regarded as a

defaultt option for interpersonal communication. However, as can be observed from self-

reportedd lies (e.g. Chapter 4; DePaulo, Kirkendol, Kashy, Wyer & Epstein, 1996), in some

situationss interactants (have to) depart from telling the truth, or even tell straightforward

lies,, in order to achieve their desired interaction goals. We propose that people may choose

too communicate deceptively when somehow within an interaction situation a

communicativee dilemma or conflict arises (see also Chapter 3). As lying in general is

regardedd morally reprehensible and most people don't like to tell lies, a communicative

conflictt arises when an actor experiences that he or she 'has to' choose between telling a

painfull or disadvantageous truth (either for the interaction partners), the actor him- or

herself,, or both or all of them) and a flattering or advantageous lie. That is, when the actor

hass to choose between either a negative outcome or a negative act. We like to stress here,

thatt we regard this communicative conflict situation as a more general form of the

communicativee dilemmas used by Bavelas, Black, Chovil, and Mullet (1990).

70 0

SituationSituation Characteristics and Answering Strategies

Inn studying equivocal communication Bavelas and colleagues provided their research

subjectss with what in fact were avoidance-avoidance conflict situations. These situations

weree designed such that interactants were likely to avoid telling the truth as well as telling

aa lie in response to the interaction partner's question. Bavelas and colleagues appeared

ratherr successful in evoking equivocal messages by offering their participants these

differentt situation vignettes. Although their primary interest thus was concerned with the

productionn of equivocal messages, their research provided some initial proof for a situation

inducedd shaping of answering strategies. What's more, as most research participants

spontaneouslyy produced an equivocal message when instructed to verbalize a reaction to

thee interaction partner in the situation vignettes, the personal characteristics of the

participantss appear to be of littl e importance for the collected type of communicative acts.

Somethingg that seems only possible when situation characteristics can somehow outweigh

personn characteristics in the selection and/or production of interpersonal behaviour.

Forr the purpose of the present study, it would be too far reaching to go into the 'person x

situation'' debate. Instead, we will take a pragmatically black-box approach and simple

statee that we adopt the concept of the 'psychological situation'. This concept implies that

individualss form situation perceptions and that the meaning of a situation for each

individuall is based on his or her individual perspective, activated cognitions, and

knowledgee structures (see Krahé, 1990; and Miller, Cody & McLaughlin, 1994 for

extensivee discussions of the relevant literature). Different individuals therefore can have

differentt perceptions of allegedly the same situation. Some situations, however, will be

perceivedd as more similar than others. As a result we presume that some situations will

evokee rather uniform or homogeneous behaviours from different individuals and other

situationss rather diverse or heterogeneous behaviours. In addition, we presume that as a

resultt of 'objective' differences in situation characteristics, in some situations hardly

anyonee will lie, while in others almost everyone will lie.

Thee former line of reasoning leads us to propose two hypotheses, both following

fromfrom our general 'situation-induced lying hypothesis' first introduced in the study

describedd in Chapter 4. The first hypothesis is, that structural relationships exist between

situationn characteristics and answering strategies, and the second hypothesis is, that in

somee situations almost everyone will depart from telling the truth while in other situations

hardlyy anyone will depart from telling the truth. Both hypotheses will be tested in the

presentt study using a scenario methodology.

71 1

ChapterChapter 6

HowHow Can we Test Situation Characteristics to Be Related to Types of Deceptive Acts?

Inn order to test our situation-induced hypotheses about lying, we will present each of a

groupp of research participants with a number of communicative conflict situations and

invitee them to write replies to the questions asked by the alleged interaction partners. The

naturee and gravity of the conflict-situations will be varied by systematically varying some

situationn characteristics. The written replies will be coded by independent coders according

too a coding scheme that will be developed from the deception typology of Buller and

Burgoonn (1994), taking into account the information that is actually provided to the

researchh participants. Next, the coded replies will be treated as the dependent variables and

usedd to examine statistically the response patterns in relation to the situation

characteristics,, which will be are treated as the independent variables.

Althoughh we could choose to 'simply' select and offer different descriptions of conflict

situations,, as appears to have been a rather common strategy among deception researchers

(e.g.. Ebesu & Miller, 1994; McComack, 1992; Lindskold & Walters, 1983; Pope &

Forsyth,, 1986), we came to the conclusion that in order to test our hypotheses more

rigorouslyrigorously we had to operate differently. In order to be able to distinguish whether

variationss in situation characteristics lead to variations in (deceptive) communication acts,

wee decided we should use systematically varied situation characteristics. Only when

situationn vignettes differ systematically on a predetermined number of situation

characteristics,, is it possible to determine to what the anticipated differences in collected

communicationn acts are to be attributed.

Wee assume three variables to be relevant in interpersonal communication situations and

thereforee within communicative conflict situations as well. The three variables were first

identifiedd in the focus group study of Backbier (1994) and then tested for their relevance in

determiningg the acceptability of telling lies (see Chapter 2). The first variable is the

communicativee goal, the second variable the relationship with the interaction partner, and

thee third variable the importance of the issue the communication situation is about. The

threee variables appeared also to be proposed as the first layer of decisive factors in the

rationall 'strategic choice model' of interpersonal influence strategies (Seibold, Cantrill &

Meyers,, 1985; Seibold, Cantrill & Meyers, 1994). Research on the nature of

communicationn goals seems to have indicated that the goals communicators pursue are

interwovenn with the relationships of the people involved in the situations (Buller &

72 2


Burgoon,, 1994; Miller, Cody & McLaughlin, 1994). Likewise, the issue or content of

(deceptive)) communication seems to be related to the kind of interpersonal relationship

interactantss have (see Chapters 4 and 5). For the purpose of the present study, however, we

usee independently manipulated variables in order to be able to test whether and how the

three,, independently and/or in interaction with one another, influence the dependent or

responsee variable.

Inn the study described in Chapter 2, each of the three variables was varied on one

dimension.. The goal of the lie was defined as the motive of the sender to tell a lie, and

variedd across three categories of motives: social, individualistic and egoistic. The person

thatt was lied to was either the best friend or an acquaintance of the liar, and therefore the

relationshipp was marked by a difference in strength of the social emotional bond. The

importancee of the issue the lie was about was either relatively important or relatively

unimportant.. The scenarios used in the study described in Chapter 2 already contained

formulationss of lies. However, when these lies as well as the explicit reference to the

motivess for telling the lies are removed from the scenarios, they become perfectly suitable

forr studying the influence of the situation characteristics on answering strategies.

InIn Conclusion

Byy offering situation descriptions in which three factors are systematically varied and

invitingg research participants to freely respond to the questions asked by the interaction

partnerr in the scenarios, we provided a new paradigm for empirical testing of our situation

inducedd lying hypothesis. The statistical tests in which the situational characteristics of

Motive,, Relation and Importance are treated as the independent or explanatory variables

andd the coded replies as dependent or response variables, revealed structural relations in

thee response patterns. It therefore is demonstrated that indeed situations can evoke people

too tell lies, and in addition, that in some situations almost everyone lies while in other

situationn almost nobody lies.

73 3

ChapterChapter 6

M e t h od d

Participants Participants

Thee participants were 342 first year psychology students of the University of Amsterdam,

1233 male and 219 female, who participated as part of a course requirement. Mean age of

thee participants was 21.07 (range 17-46 years). Data collection took place during one

collectivee session at the beginning of the fall term in 1995.

Design Design

Forr the stimulus material a 3 (Motive) x 2 (Importance) x 2 (Relation) mixed within-

betweenn factorial design was used. The within-subjects variables involved manipulations

off the motive to lie (social (S) vs. individualistic (I) vs. egoistic (E)) and the closeness of

thee relation between the person who was asking the question and the person who had to

respondd (best friend (F) vs. acquaintance (A)). The between-subjects variable involved a

manipulationn of the relative importance of the issue the question was referring to

(importantt issue (I) vs. unimportant issue (U)). A manipulation of the gender of the person

askingg the question (male vs. female), was nested within Relation in order to reduce inter-

groupp variance due to sex interactions. By crossing the three factors, 12 different situation

categoriess could be distinguished.

Scenarios Scenarios

Thee 12 situation categories were operationalised by means of short descriptions of

everydayy situations or scenarios. The scenarios, which were previously used in the

experimentt reported in Chapter 2, were adapted for the present study. The explicit

referencee to the motive for lying and also the lie itself were discarded from the original

situationn descriptions (see Appendix A). In order to ensure that the results of the 12

situationn categories would be comparable, and to enlarge the representativeness of the

results,, four stories were used for each motive. Within each story, the relative importance

off the issue was altered by replacing some words. The closeness of the relationship with

thee interaction partner was altered by replacing 'your best friend' with 'an acquaintance'.

AA communicative dilemma was created by giving information that (possibly) implied more

orr less opposite interests, opinions or expectations for the sender and the target person. Of

thee 48 scenarios, the 12 stories representing the important issues and the 12 stories

representingg the unimportant issues are presented in Appendix B.

74 4


Procedure Procedure

Eightt questionnaires were composed containing six scenarios from the crossing of the three

motivee categories (S, I, E) and the two relationship categories (F, A). The relative

importancee of the issue (I or U) was held constant across scenarios within the same

questionnaire.. The order in which the scenarios were presented, was equal for each

questionnairee (S-F, I-A, E-F, S-A, I-F, E-A). By choosing different stories to represent

eachh situation category within a questionnaire, finally, all questionnaires differed from one

another.. Female participants were instructed to address the scenarios with a female

interactionn partner on the top of each page and male participants to address the scenarios

withh a male interaction partner on the bottom of each page. Each scenario was followed by

thee question that read: "If you find yourself in a situation as described in the scenario, what

wouldd you say to your acquaintance?" or "If you find yourself in a situation as described in

thee scenario, what would you say to your best friend?". Participants were instructed to try

too formulate their answer in one sentence. Since eight questionnaires each containing six

scenarioss were randomly distributed over 342 participants, 40 to 45 independent answers

perr scenario were collected.

CodingCoding the Answers

Thee development of the categories in which the answers were coded, was a multi-step

processs in which we (a) developed a preliminary coding scheme on the basis of the

deceptionn typology of Buller and Burgoon (1994) and the definition of lying proposed by

Meerumm Terwogt-Kouwenhoven (1993)'; (b) coded a sample of 15 answers per

questionnairee and modified the coding scheme as necessary; (c) coded all the answers; (d)

reviewedd all coding work for consistency, adding clarifications to the coding scheme; and

(e)) recoded all the answers using the final coding scheme. It appeared that seven categories

weree sufficient to code the answers of our participants (see below). The categories were

rankedd from a totally true to a totally untrue answer (with the exception of the last residual

category).. Inter-coder agreement was established by means of calculating Cohen's Kappa

(Siegell & Castellan, 1988). For the 48 different scenarios Kappa ranged from 0.64 to 1.00.

Forr the eight different questionnaires Kappa ranged from 0.88 to 0.96. It is therefore

concludedd that inter-coder agreement is 'substantial' to 'almost perfect' (Eggen & Sanders,

1993). .

75 5

ChapterChapter 6

CodingCoding Scheme

Thee complete coding scheme is presented below. Firstly, in order to allow the reader to

familiarisee him/herself with the considerations that guided the coding of the answers.

Secondly,, in order to allow the reader to familiarise him/herself with the variety of answers

thatt were formulated in response to the questions in the scenarios.

1.1. Tells the truth :

-- when the participant formulated an answer that is in accordance with the information

givenn in the scenario as being the truth (e.g. "You look awful", "The snacks taste terrible",

"II did not take enough rest");

-- when the participant reported to tell the truth (e.g. "I'l l tell the truth", "The truth").

2.2. Softens the truth :

-- when the participant formulated an answer that is in accordance with the truth but adds a

singlee word that is meant to make the truth appear less hard (e.g. "Not too nice", "Not too

good",, "Not a real good impression");

-- when the participant formulated an answer that is in accordance with the truth but adds

somethingg positive to make the truth appear less hard (e.g. "They look beautiful, but taste

awful",, "I did do too much, but you know me, I can't sit still"); ;

-- when the participant formulated an answer that reveals his or her real opinion by

implicationn (e.g. "You usually look better", "You usually play better", "You look tired").

3.3. Equivocates (Avoids telling the truth as well as telling a lie) :

-- when the participant formulated an answer in the form of a question without revealing his

orr her real opinion (e.g. "Can't you ask somebody else?", "Was he in a bad mood?");

-- when the participant formulated an answer on a question that was not asked (e.g. "He

isn'tt my type of guy", "It's not really my taste");

-- when the answer can only be interpreted as the participant avoiding to tell the truth as

welll as a lie (e.g. "I do not really know her yet", "I've just come to know him", "I did my

best",, "Could be better", "Great, you've won!").

4.4. Omitted part of the truth :

-- when the participant formulated an answer in which a relevant piece of information is

omittedd so that the participant makes a different impression on the receiver than when this

informationn was revealed (e.g. "I forgot the time" without admitting that s/he was enjoying

aa drink on a terrace; "The glass fell" or "It is an accident" without admitting that it was due

76 6


too the participants' own clumsiness that s/he spilled the wine; "It was already old" without

admittingg that s/he expected the washing machine to break down very soon);

-- when the participant did a concession without revealing that s/he does not actually feel

likee having a drink, offering help, or having the friend or acquaintance staying over in the

2 2 weekendd (e.g. "Come over", "I'm coming over", "I'l l help you").

5.5. Tells a softened lie :

-- when the participant told something false while adding a single or some words by which

hiss or her real opinion emerges (e.g. "nice I guess", "looks OK", "might do").

-- or when the participant stated something truthful in addition to something untruthful (e.g.

"Al ll right, but could be better", "He seems nice to me, but I do not really know him yet",

4 4

"I'mm busy, and also, I don't really feel like it").

6.6. Tells a lie :

-- when the participant formulated an answer that is totally untrue, a falsification of the truth

orr a denial of the truth (e.g. "They taste delicious", "You look fantastic", "He seems nice to

me",, "I did get a flat tire", "I took a lot of rest", "No, I had no idea", "I don't have time",

"Sorry,, I already have another appointment");

-- when an essential part of the answer was untrue and something was added that is already

knownn to the receiver or that is not revealing the opinion or actual knowledge of the sender

(e.g.. "I knew the machine was old, but I had no idea that it would break down so soon",

"Youu can come over, but not for too long. I've an appointment later on.").

7.. Something else:

-- when the participant stated that s/he would never do something like the behaviour

describedd in the scenario (e.g. "I would never do such a stupid thing", "Doesn't occur", "He

needd not ask, I already would have returned the money");

-- when the formulation of the answer was too vague or ambiguous to be coded into one of

thee other categories.

R e s uu I t s

Overall Overall

Inn Table 6.1 the frequency distributions are presented that resulted from the coding of the

freee responses of the participants. Overall about 25% of the responses could be classified

77 7

ChapterChapter 6

ass telling the truth and about 75% as departing (to a lesser or a larger extent) from the

truth.. The category of telling the truth (category 1) was largest, followed by the category of

tellingg a lie (category 6) and the category of telling a softened truth (category 2). In case of

thee scenarios appealing to a social motive none of the replies could be categorised as

'tellingg part of the truth' (category 4), suggesting that this type of answering strategy is

inappropriatee for the scenarios that were used. Only 2% of the responses were classified as

'somethingg else' (category 7); the most common reason being that participants objected to

thee alleged behaviour in the scenarios appealing to an egoistic motive.

Tablee 6.1 Four-Way Cross-Tabulation of Explanatory Variables (Motive,

Importance, Importance,

Explanatoryy variables

Mott Imp

Sociall Import

Unimp p

Indivv Import

Unimp p

Egoistt Import

Unimp p

Total l

Rel l

Friend d

Acq q

Friend d

Acq q

Friend d

Acq q

Friend d

Acq q

Friend d

Acq q

Friend d

Acq q

Relation)Relation) with Response

Responsee variable

I I

30 0

13 3

33 3

14 4

63 3

47 7

96 6

72 2

42 2

32 2

52 2

38 8

532 2

2 2

49 9

26 6

76 6

47 7

29 9

28 8

28 8

21 1

9 9

6 6

13 3

8 8

340 0

'' Variable (Answering

Answeringg Type (1

3 3

39 9

58 8

32 2

65 5

7 7

6 6

4 4

7 7

8 8

4 4

15 5

3 3

248 8

4 4

. .

--

--

--

27 7

13 3

24 4

17 7

65 5

34 4

26 6

17 7

223 3

5 5

34 4

43 3

29 9

27 7

7 7

14 4

3 3

5 5

5 5

16 6

15 5

11 1

209 9

-7)* *

6 6

17 7

29 9

I I

20 0

30 0

60 0

18 8

50 0

32 2

69 9

42 2

90 0

458 8

Type) Type)

7 7

_ _

--

2 2

--

6 6

1 1

--

1 1

8 8

8 8

10 0

6 6

42 2

Tot t

169 9

169 9

173 3

173 3

169 9

169 9

173 3

173 3

169 9

169 9

173 3

173 3

2052 2

** 1 = Tells Truth; 2 = Softens Truth; 3 = Equivocates; 4 = Omitted Part of Truth; 5 = Softens Lie; 6 = Tells a Lie;; 7 = Something Else

78 8


Tablee 6.2 Overview of the Tests of Partial Associations between the Explanatory

VariablesVariables (Motive. Importance, Relation) and the Polytomous Response

VariableVariable (Answer)

Model l

1.. Motive x Importance x



4.. Importance x Relation

5.. Motive x Importance

6.. Motive x Relation

7.. Importance x Relation

8.. Motive x Answer

9.. Importance x Answer

10.. Relation x Answer

11.. Motive

12.. Importance

13.. Relation

14.. Answer

Relation n

Answer r

Answer r

xx Answer

df f

2 2

12 2

12 2

6 6

2 2

2 2

1 1

12 2

6 6

6 6

2 2

1 1

1 1

6 6

Partiall %2

6.26 6

51.47 7

29.59 9

11.29 9

2.67 7

2.25 5

0.17 7

857.73 3

39.01 1

133.72 2

0.00 0

0.28 8

0.00 0

634.13 3

Probability y

.044 4

.000 0

.003 3

.080 0

.263 3

.325 5

.683 3

.000 0

.000 0

.000 0

1.00 0

.596 6

1.00 0

.000 0

StructuralStructural Relations

Byy means of fitting logit models it was tested whether there are any significant structural

relationshipss between the three explanatory variables and the polytomous1 response

variablee (c.f. Fienberg, 1994). In Table 6.2 the results for the test of partial associations are

presented.. The significant main effect for Answer (model 14) points to the fact that the

frequenciess within tfiis variable varied for the answering categories. Five of the six

interactionss involving'the response variable have significant test statistics (models 2, 3, 8, 9

andd 10) suggesting that the distribution of the responses were related to the factors

11AA polytomous variable has multiple answering options that together form a categorical or ordinal scale.

79 9

ChapterChapter 6

operationalisedd in the scenarios. How the variables are related will become clear when we

lookk at the frequency distributions of these significant first- and second-order interactions.

Tablee 6 .3 Frequencies of Answering Type Split by Motive (Social, Individualistic, Egoistic),

SplitSplit by Importance (Important, Unimportant) and Split by Relation (Best Friend,

Acquaintance) Acquaintance)

Answeringg Type (1-7)

1 1 Total l

Social l

Individualistic c

Egoistic c

Important t

Unimportant t

Bestt Friend

Acquaintance e

90 0

278 8

164 4

227 7

305 5

316 6

216 6

198 8

106 6

36 6

147 7

193 3

204 4

136 6

194 4

24 4

30 0

122 2

126 6

105 5

143 3

1333 67 2 684

811 29 158 8 684

1422 47 233 32 684

1399 119 237 23 1014

844 90 221 19 1038

1422 93 140 26 1026

811 116 318 16 1026

** 1 = Tells Truth; 2 = Softens Truth; 3 = Equivocates; 4 = Omitted Part of Truth; 5 = Softens Lie; 6 = Tells a Lie;; 7 = Something Else

First-OrderFirst-Order Interactions

Inn Table 6.3 the aggregated frequencies of each of the seven answering categories are

givenn for the three different categories of motives, the two categories of issue importance

andd the two relationship categories. First, we will turn to the distribution of responses

involvingg Motive and Answering Type. In the case of social motives the categories of

softeningg the truth (category 2) and avoiding the truth (category 3) were about equally

large.. In case of individualistic motives the category of telling the truth (category I) was by

farr the largest and in case of egoistic motives the category of lies (category 6) was largest.

Inspectionn of the distribution of responses involving Importance and Answering Type

80 0


revealedd that in case of important issues slightly more lies (category 6) were told than

truthss (category 1). In case of unimportant issues this is the other way around, the truth

(categoryy I) was told more frequently than were lies (category 6). Finally, the distribution

off responses involving Relation and Answering Type revealed that the truth (category 1)

wass told most frequently to the participants1 alleged best friend while lies (category 6) were

toldd most frequently to an acquaintance.

Second-OrderSecond-Order Interactions

Inn Table 6.4 the distributions of the responses for the two significant second-order

interactionss are presented. Inspection of part A of the table reveals that in case of a social

motivee the strategy of avoiding to tell the truth (category 3) was most popular when the

scenarioss involved a relatively important issue and the strategy of softening the truth

(categoryy 2) when the scenarios involved a relatively unimportant issue. The manipulation

off issue importance appeared of less influence in case of individualistic and egoistic

motives.. Most participants told the truth (category 1) in case of scenarios appealing to an

individualisticc motive. In case of relatively important issues the amount of participants

tellingg a lie (category 6) was only a littl e smaller than the amount of participants telling the

truth.. In case of scenarios appealing to egoistic motives most participants told a lie

(categoryy 6). However, in case of relatively important issues the strategy of telling part of

thee truth (category 4) was only slightly less popular than the strategy of telling a lie.

Inspectionn of part B of the table reveals that in case of scenarios appealing to a

sociall motive most participants softened the truth (category 2) towards their alleged best

friendfriend and avoided to tell truth (category 3) towards an alleged acquaintance. In case of

scenarioss appealing to an individualistic motive the truth (category 1) was most frequently

toldd towards the participants' alleged best friend, while almost as many lies (category 6) as

truthss (category 1) were told towards an alleged acquaintance. In case of scenarios

appealingg to egoistic motives the difference between answering strategies towards

participants'' alleged friends and acquaintances was clearest. The categories of telling the

truthh (category 1) and telling part of the truth (category 4) were almost equally large in

casee of the alleged best friend. The category of telling a lie (category 6) was more than

twicee as large as the category of telling the truth (category 1) in case of an acquaintance.

81 1

ChapterChapter 6

Tablee 6.4 Three-Way Cross-Tabulation of Significant Second-Order Interactions

A.. Motive by Importance by Answering Type

Social l

Individualistic c

Egoistic c

Important t

Unimportant t

Important t

Unimportant t

Important t

Unimportant t

1 1

43 3

47 7

110 0

168 8

74 4

90 0


2 2

75 5

123 3

57 7

49 9

15 5

21 1

3 3

97 7

97 7

13 3

11 1

12 2

18 8

4 4

--

--

40 0

41 1

99 9

43 3

5 5

77 7

56 6

21 1

8 8

21 1

26 6

6 6

46 6

21 1

90 0

68 8

101 1

132 2

Total l

338 8

344 4

331 1

345 5

322 2

330 0

2010 0

B.. Motive by Relation by Answering Type

Social l

Individualistic c

Egoistic c

Friend d

Acquaintance e

Friend d

Acquaintance e

Friend d

Acquaintance e

1 1

63 3

27 7

159 9

119 9

94 4

70 0


2 2

125 5

73 3

57 7

49 9

22 2

14 4

3 3

71 1

123 3

11 1

13 3

23 3

7 7

4 4

--

--

51 1

30 0

91 1

51 1

5 5

63 3

70 0

10 0

19 9

20 0

27 7

6 6

18 8

49 9

48 8

no o 74 4

159 9

Total l

340 0

342 2

336 6

340 0

324 4

328 8

2010 0

** 1 = Tells Truth; 2 = Softens Truth; 3 = Equivocates; 4 = Omitted Part of Truth; 5 = Softens Lie; 66 = Tells a Lie

AdditionalAdditional Analysis

Ass for each of the three different motives four different stories were written in which the

relativee importance of the issue and the relative closeness of the relation were

systematicallyy varied, logit models also could be fitted to the response distributions of the

twelvee stories in order to learn more about the structural relations between situation

82 2


characteristicss and answering strategies. It appeared that for 10 stories significant first-

orderr interactions were found between Importance and Answering Type and/or Relation

andd Answering Type.

Inn case of the scenarios involving the story in which the participant allegedly met the

interactionn partners' new partner or friend for the first time (social motive; scenarios 4a and

4bb in Appendix B), a significant second-order interaction was found reflecting a very

heterogeneouss response pattern. When the alleged interaction partner was an acquaintance

mostt participants avoided to tell the truth. When the alleged interaction partner was the

bestt friend and had just married (important issue), participants tended to tell the truth or

avoidd the truth. When it was the alleged best friend who introduced her/his new

boy/girlfriendd (unimportant issue), participants tended to soften the truth, avoid the truth,

orr tell a softened lie.

Inn case of the scenarios involving the story in which the participant allegedly had left some

moneyy after buying a birthday present (egoistic motive; scenarios 1 la and 1 lb in Appendix

B),, a significant effect only for Answering Type was found. The response pattern was

ratherr homogeneous, either participants told the whole truth or told only part of the truth.

Fourr of the six participants who did tell a lie, did so in reply to the question of an alleged

acquaintance.. Overall the present results confirm the notion that situation characteristic

weree related to the obtained answering strategies.

D i s c u s s i on n

Inn order to arrive at a better understanding of why people communicate deceptively in

everydayy interpersonal interactions, we decided to test whether and how situational

characteristicss evoke deceptive communication acts. For this purpose we developed a

scenarioo study with a free-response format. The scenarios were slightly adapted versions of

thosee that had been previously developed for a study of the situational determinants of the

acceptabilityy of telling lies (Chapter 2). The scenarios sketched so-called 'conflict

situations'.. Situations in which the actor feels that a choice has to be made between telling

aa painful or disadvantageous truth and a flattering or advantageous lie, either to the actor

83 3

ChapterChapter 6

him-- or herself, to the target or both of them. The results showed that most replies could be

labelledd as softened or even straightforward lies. The category of telling the truth, however,

wass very large as well. Softening the truth and avoiding the truth were the most popular

answeringg strategies in case of scenarios appealing to a social motive. The scenarios

appealingg to an individualistic motive led to a preference for the truth, while the scenarios

appealingg to an egoistic motive led to a preference for lies. Complete lies and complete

truthss were used equally often in reply to questions about relatively important issues. In

replyy to questions about relatively unimportant issues, telling the truth was used more often

thann telling a lie. Finally, lies were told almost twice as often in answer to a question of the

participants'' alleged acquaintance than to a question of the participants' alleged best friend.

Thee significant second-order interactions between the dependent and independent variables

revealedd that the distribution of answering strategies depend largely on the specific

combinationn of situation characteristics. The pattern of results thus lead us to conclude that

bothh our hypotheses were confirmed by the collected data. First, that structural

relationshipss exist between situation characteristics and answering strategies, and second,

thatt in some situations almost everyone will depart from telling the truth while in other

situationss hardly anyone will depart from telling the truth.

Ass said, three factors were purposely varied in the scenarios. The additional analysis

revealed,, however, that response patterns varied with the different operationalizations of

thee factors within a category. For instance, although the birthday present scenario was

originallyy designed to appeal to an egoistic motive, the majority of participants did not tell

aa lie and therefore did not act egoistically. Only six of the 167 participants who were

providedd with one of the four variations on the story denied that (a littl e or large) amount

off money was left that according to prevailing social norms should be equally divided

amongg the two interactants. Although it is possible that most participants may have

decidedd to resist the temptation to keep the money to themselves, some of them may not

evenn have been tempted. Reasons for resisting the temptation may involve: the possibility

thatt the real price of the present will be found out, seeing the perfect opportunity to show

offf one's' honesty, or perceiving oneself as a person who is not able to lie very well.

Reasonss for not even being tempted may involve: holding strong values about 'who is or is

nott entitled to what', earning abundant money, or not seeing the opportunity to enrich

oneselff at the expense of the interaction partner. An example of a story that actually did

leadd the majority of participants to tell an egoistic lie, was the scenario with the old

84 4


machinee that had broken down soon after it had been sold to the interaction partner.

Comparisonn of the two scenarios led to the insight that as in the second scenario a social

normm had already been broken, the villainous act of selling a machine you expect to break

downn soon, participants had only one option to save their face and/or their finances. This

optionn was concealing the previous misconduct by denying the implicit accusation of foul

playy by the interaction partner.

Thee observations described above thus forced us to consider a fourth factor as being of

influencee to the pattern of answering strategies that are found in relation to the three

situationn characteristics. This fourth factor seems to originate from the different ways we

operationalisedd the motive, situation importance and relationship in the scenarios. This

fourthh factor we will call 'action possibilities', as it appeared that the amount of action

possibilitiess a situation offers the interactant(s) can actually vary extensively. For instance,

ass in all of the scenarios a question was asked by the interaction partner, participants did

nott have the option to say nothing. They had to respond and thus the option to conceal

informationn was greatly reduced compared to situations in which a person is not addressed

withh an (explicit or implicit) question. Second, some questions in fact appeared to mark the

beginningg of a long conversation while others marked the casual exchange of only two or

threee sentences. Third, sometimes the facts as presented in the scenarios left room for

severall alternative interpretations or goal perceptions, while in other scenarios the facts left

roomm for only one or two options. Fourth, in some situations lying is the more convenient

optionn compared to the truth, while in other situations lying is the necessary means too meet

aa certain goal (instrumental, interpersonal or identity related; Buller & Burgoon, 1994).

Furthermore,, in some situations it is possible to stay rather close to the truth in order to

bringg the interaction to a satisfactory end, while in other situations one has to resort to an

outrightt lie to achieve the same. Finally, in some situations it seems relatively easy to get

awayy with either the truth or a lie, while in other situations this seems much harder to

accomplish. .

Hadd we not decided to use the previously developed scenarios and discarded the lies as

welll as the explicit reference to the motives for telling the lies, and had we not used a free-

responsee format, we probably would never have considered the importance of this fourth

situationn characteristic for deceptive communication. With this new hindsight knowledge,

however,, it appears rather obvious to envisage that the more action possibilities a situation

85 5

ChapterChapter 6

bears,, the more individual interpretation possibilities the actors have, as a consequence of

whichh interactants will come to more varied communication acts based upon their more

variedd cognitions, knowledge structures, perceived skills, etcetera. However, one should

alsoo bear in mind the possibility that although people might seem to act in a similar

fashion,, this act may still come from largely different mindsets. Future research might

fruitfull yy examine the influence of action possibilities and restrictions on telling lies or the

truth.. Equally, it might address the considerations that underlie the selection or fabrication

off various (deceptive) communication acts.

Thee present study is rather unique, in the way that it is the first and only experiment known

of,, that collected about 40 to 45 truthful and untruthful reactions to 48 systematically

differingg situation descriptions. Although our research participants were not instructed to

telll lies, as is the case in most other studies on deceptive communication (c.f. Riggio,

1994),, a huge amount of answers appeared to depart (to a lesser or greater extend) from the

truth.. Participants were simply instructed to formulate a response that would be in

accordancee with their reaction to a real life situation. Although no mention was made of

thee possibility of lying as an answering strategy to solve the dilemma evoked by the story

inn the scenarios, participants spontaneously reacted by formulating lies. They lied to the

allegedd interaction partner in the scenario, seemingly without fearing detection or

sanctioningg on the part of the researcher. As the real state of affairs (the truth) was

explicitlyy presented in the scenarios, it would have been easiest for the participants to copy

thiss part in their answers. They did not do this, however, and therefore it seems warranted

too conclude that the participants' first concern was not to present oneself as a very honest

person.. As no pressure was laid on them, as they were really anonymous to the researcher

andd no actual interaction between target or researcher took place, the results can not

possiblyy be strongly affected by social desirability bias. In addition, when participants felt

offendedd by their alleged behaviour in a situation description, they revealed this fact in

theirr answer. Finally, it is noteworthy to mention that none of the participants solely

formulatedd truths nor did participants solely formulate lies.

Althoughh the present findings seem to warrant the conclusion that reactions are largely

situationn specific, several issues need more elaboration and/or empirical support. Our

researchh participants were mainly young, white, middleclass, Dutch psychology students

andd therefore the structural relations and response patterns that were found probably are

86 6


prototypicall for this group. When different participant groups are provided with the same

scenarios,, for instance elderly persons, religious persons, or persons with a different

culturall background, we expect to find different response patterns and possibly different

structurall relations as well. The reason for this is, that we expect different conventions,

sociall norms and values to play a role in the situation interpretation and action selection or

fabricationn sequence. When other scenarios are created to represent the different situation

categories,, we anticipate to find different response patterns as well. As only same sex

dyadss were used and only social-emotional relationships varying in closeness, it remains to

bee demonstrated what mixed dyads and for instance differences in legal authority between

interactantss will bring. Finally, the present study was solely about reactive lies and

thereforee proactive lying still needs to be addressed.

Thee present findings affirm previous conclusions regarding the notion that most people

don'tt really have a problem with lying now and then, as it can be regarded as a highly

adaptive,, often social, often important, often acceptable and sometimes even necessary

communicationn strategy. In addition, it seems that most people must have the experience

thatt most of the time they don't have to fear detection of their deceptive communication

acts,, as the amount of distrust on the part of the targets usually is small and therefore the

numberr of detection attempts they take upon. Equally, it seems to be true that targets

frequentlyy are hearing what they were expecting or even willing to hear. Consequently,

interactionn partners tend to accept each others messages and answers and therefore both

quitee often must succeed in achieving their intended communication goals.

Wheree the present findings point to as well, is the fact that one can not reasonably

generalisee from the observation of someone's deceptive communication act in one random

situationn to another random situation. As deceptive acts are tailored to meet a specific

interactionn goal in a specific and perhaps unique situation or context, one or even several

incidentss of a person telling a lie, is not likely to be representative for the general

behaviourall repertoire of that person. Therefore, deception researchers, both those who are

interestedd in lie detection as well as those who are interested in gaining a more thoroughly

understandingg of the function of deceptive communication, are strongly encouraged to

studyy this highly complex and intriguing phenomenon with a clear awareness of the

contextt in which it is normally used.

87 7

ChapterChapter 6

Notes: :

1.. A lie is a message of which the messenger is aware that what he or she is

communicatingg does not correspond with the knowledge, views, feelings or motives he or

shee holds; and that he or she is making the statement with the intention of creating a

discrepancyy between the information known to himself or herself and that known of the

receiverr (Meerum Terwogt-Kouwenhoven, 1993, p. 25).

2.. We figured that choosing such an answer in fact reveals that the participant gives

priorityy to his or her opinion that one ought to help others (especially when the person who

askss you for help, or asks for a favour, is a friend). See also P. Drew (1984): 'Instead of

sayingg that they did not or are not going to do something, speakers commonly assert an

inabilityy to do it." In other words, people tend to refer to an external factor in order to make

(implicitly)) clear that they will or do not fulfi l an expectation or request.

3.. As this way of formulating an answer might be typically Dutch, the kernel of the

formulationn may be lost in the translation from Dutch to English.

4.. The truthful part of the answer is probably meant to signal to the receiver that the

opinionn formulated in the other part of the answer should not be taken too seriously. In

otherr words, it is probably a signal that the sender does not really want to tell a lie.

88 8

uva-dare (digital academic repository) disentangling ... · communicationn and deception, proposed...

Documents