It’s Sunday night around 11pm as I type this intro. When I started doing these journal posts a few weeks ago I was planning on posting on Saturday’s but now as time has played out, Saturday’s are pretty busy and Sundays are working out better. The new plan is to just post on Saturday or Sunday. Read below for what I was up to this week relating to deception studies.
I updated my spreadsheets, finished Duped, and started History’s Greatest Deceptions.
Saturday, October 14, 2023
I read chapters 7 and 8 tonight.
Chapter 7 discusses various ways to define deception. Levine throws up a definition that moves away from the popular ones which include a conscious intent to deceive.
There is a notable lack of citations on page 103 but based on my memory the information is correct. The coverage feels shallow but I think it serves its purpose as a general overview of deception definitions. I mostly agree with Levine’s arguments and definition here. Deception should be defined more broadly than it commonly is in the literature.
The rest of the chapter is mostly him sharing anecdotes to illustrate the diversity of deceptions and to drive his point home that deception should be defined more widely.
Chapter 8 covers IMT (information manipulation theory) and IMT2. It’s a deception theory heavily influenced by Grice’s Maxims. It’s fascinating and I’ve had similar thoughts myself independent of this.
“If IMT2 and TDT are right, however, honesty and deception are not random. People deceive when the truth is problematic for them.”[p.132]
I’m not sure I agree with this though. I lie for entertainment when I do livestreams. Most of my regular viewers know what I say is false but people who are new to the streams sometimes believe what I say to be true. Would it be considered problematic if my regular audience was slightly less entertained? Or would they remain equally as entertained without that bit?
If considered lying that is not based on the alternative being a problematic truth, does this means IMT2 and TDT are false? The statement would read “People sometimes deceive when the truth is problematic for them, and sometimes when it isn’t.” Can the second sentence in that original quote stand alone from the first? If IMT2 and TDT are right, I can still lie on stream, as these lies are not random. However, the following sentence would be nullified.
Sunday, October 15, 2023
I read chapters 9, 10, and 11 tonight.
Chapter 9 is about the prevalence of lying and tackles how common lying is. It’s the first module of TDT. The basics are that lying is rare and most lies are produced by a “few prolific liars”, a few people who lie way above average.
Page 137 says “Absent psychopathology, people deceive only when the truth is problematic”. I’m not sure if this account for lying for entertainment. Maybe the problem would be that the truth is less entertaining.
Chapter 10 is about motives for lying. Page 166 has a list of motives. Number 8 is Humor/Joke. So maybe the earlier passages were just worded in a way that made me think humor didn’t have a place in TDT.
Chapter 11 defines and explores truth bias and truth default. Both of these are considered good things. Page 184 contains a list of 6 things that can impact truth-bias.
Page 193 lists 5 triggers that can pull people out of the truth-default state: “(a) a projected motive for deception, (b) behavioral displays associated with dishonest demeanor, (c) a lack of coherence in message content, (d) a lack of correspondence between communication content and some knowledge of reality, or (e) information from a third party warning of potential deception”.
These share heavy overlap with The Big 5 of Truth Judgement: 1) credibility, 2) coherence, 3) compatibility, 4) consensus, and 5) evidence.
Monday, October 16, 2023
I finished adding publication dates to my library spreadsheet. I also added the publisher information.
I read chapters 12 and 13.
Chapter 12 focused on the veracity effect and truth-lie base rates in studies. People judge truth correctly more often than lies. Truth-lie base rates provide predictability of what the results of the study will be.
Chapter 13 explained the slightly better than chance results in past deception studies. Takeaway is that a few transparent liars make guessing the lies easy.
Tuesday, October 17, 2023
I updated my read deception books list, the list of books in the genre of deception studies that I’ve read. I’m at 65 as of this update.
I also finished Duped, but haven’t added it to my read list.
Chapter 14 was about how deception is really detected and what we can do to become more accurate in detecting it. Page 287 offers 5 paths to higher accuracy.
Chapter 15 wraps up the book by summarizing everything.
At the end are notes, a bibliography, and an index. Overall, 5/5 star book.
Wednesday-Friday, October 18, 2023
Wednesday through Friday I started a new book, namely Eric Chaline’s History’s Greatest Deceptions: And the People Who Planned Them. I’ve read 106 pages out of the 251. It’s a compilation book where each case of deception is given a handful of pages.