Interpersonal Deception Essay

Research has shown that sex may in fact be an important variable when it comes to interpersonal deception. One study conducted by Dindia and Allen (1992) found that women tend to self-disclose more than men. Women tend to have a warmer demeanor, use more physical touch, and have more animated facial expression compared to men (DePaulo, 1992). Western culture has laid the notion that women may lie more than men, especially to other women. They are depicted in the media as gossipers. Additionally, DePaulo, Epstein, & Wyer (1993) found that women tell lies to nurture intimacy and supportiveness. One might then assume that most lies told by women are other-oriented. Two self-report studies were conducted. One study was done on college students while the other involved community members. Within the college sample, females told substantially less self-centered lies than their male counterparts, and considerably more other-oriented lies (DePaulo et al., 1996). The sex of the individual to whom the lie was told was also notable. In both the community and college samples, both men and women told noticeably more self-centered lies and less altruistic lies to men than to …show more content…
One study found that age has a curvilinear relationship in regards to lie detection (Ekman & O’Sullivan, 1991).Results indicated that people tend to increase in the accuracy of detecting lies from childhood to early/middle adulthood. As they age further, this ability gradually begins to decline. In another study by DePaulo et al. (1982), results showed that individuals ranging from six grade to college have the ability to detect true feelings from feigned feelings. However, the younger individuals had a higher probability of being misled by overt false affect. On the other hand, older children more often attend to vocal cues rather than visual cues when deciphering potentially deceptive statements (Zuckerman, DePaulo, & Rosenthal,