Pamela Meyer - Liespotting: Proven Techniques to Detect Deception

I didnt set out to become a liespotter. I am neither a scientist nor a psychologist, and I never imagined I would spend three years researching deception, then develop a system we can use to protect ourselves from it. But I learned that the average person is lied to close to two hundred times a day. I learned that we are no better than monkeys at determining fact from fiction. And I learned that none of the sophisticated lie-detection techniques used by security experts and government agents had been adapted for everyday professional use. It seemed almost criminal not to make it my business to make sure that everyone has access to this invaluable new tool.

Calling myself a liespottera human lie detectormight suggest that I live in anticipation of being deceived, wary and suspicious of everyone with whom I come into contact. Actually, becoming a trained liespotter allows you to do the opposite. Youll know you have the tools you need to protect yourself in situations in which you might encounter falsehood or obfuscation. Becoming a liespotter doesnt inspire paranoiait frees you from it.

DECEPTION AT WORK

Like everyone, Ive experienced deception and suffered the disappointment and disillusionment that accompanies it. I witnessed it in the business world almost before the ink was dry on my diploma. When I headed out into the world as a freshly minted Harvard Business School graduate, I didnt expect to see dishonesty running rampant. Was I in for a surprise.

My first job out of school was in the international department of a feature film company. I love film and was delighted to have landed what seemed a dream job, which in many ways it was. Yet I was shocked to discover that the industry was riddled with dodgy yet extremely common accounting practices. For example, it wasnt unusual to find that the millions we had offered for an independent film in a pre-buy had immediately gone instead to bankroll the sellers prior debt in what amounted to a kind of Ponzi scheme. It was also not unusual for the head of a company to pay a friend to determine the value of his companys film catalogs. That valuation would then be used by investment bankers to establish the value of the company itself. The bankers, however, knowing they would receive a small percentage of the IPO, had every incentive to inflate the companys already inflated worthand they did.

Fraudulent behavior was so common, especially in those days and especially when dealing with companies that didnt have stable revenue streams, that most people seemed almost inured to it, as though it were a price to pay for doing business in such an exciting industry. Still, the dirty dealing shocked me, and though I loved the business, I felt disillusioned. When the film company moved to Los Angeles I decided to accept a job at National Geographic Television, where I ultimately served as vice president of the program enterprises division.

DECEPTION IN NATURE

I loved the job, and I had the good fortune to work in an extremely honest environment. My colleagues behavior was unimpeachable, and I had nothing but trust and respect for the people with whom I worked.

Yet every day, I witnessed extraordinary acts of deception.

In charge of acquiring natural history films for the National Geographic Explorer television series, I spent countless hours watching nature videos submitted by almost every independent filmmaker or television station in the world. Watching that many nature shows, it became impossible for me not to see that deception is intrinsic in naturepredators camouflage themselves against seabeds and forest floors, spiders build models of themselves to avoid detection, birds fake injury to lure enemies away from their nests.

The more cognitively advanced the animal, the more sophisticated the deceit. The most entertaining videos were those featuring primates and dolphinsthey are masters of guile and trickerybut they were also the most revealing. The creative schemes these mammals used to get away with unacceptable behavior werent all that different from what humans have dreamt up. Even plants could be con artists: the orchid Ophrys speculum uses pheromones and coloring to excite male wasps and fool them into thinking they are copulating with a female wasp, when in fact all that rubbing is simply helping the orchid spread its pollen.

I began to suspect that if lying and fraud are innate in the animal kingdom, humans must also be hardwired for deception. When years later I began the research that would ultimately become the backbone of this book, I discovered that scientists have firmly established that lying is in fact one of the major building blocks of human social life.

FIRSTHAND EXPERIENCE

Youd think that my exposure to and interest in dishonesty would mean I might be a little more attuned to it when I saw it. That, unfortunately, was not the case. It turns out that when it came to detecting lies and fraud, I was as gullible as anybody else.

In 1994, I left National Geographic to start my own company, Manhattan Studios. Searching for an assistant, I interviewed a large pool of candidates and thought Id found a perfect match for my needs: a brilliant, personable Ivy League grad. She quickly exceeded my expectations, handling every job I gave her with exemplary professionalism. It was the heyday of the mid-nineties Internet boom, and she seemed enamored with the potential of the Web business. She did research, she acted as a project manager, she ran our Web siteshe could do anything. In a small company, its hard not to get attached to your colleagues, especially when working the long hours required by any start-up. I felt close to most of my staff, and in particular to this individual who knew so much about my life and who had told me so much about her own.

The company was thriving when I was offered a full-time job at the Ford Foundation running their media fund, which by default lessened how much time and attention I could spend on what was going on at Manhattan Studios. I trusted my staff implicitly, however, to handle the daily workings of the company and fill me in as necessary.

One Saturday, knowing I had fallen behind, I started going through the company books. I found that the numbers didnt add up. I tried again, but still, there was a discrepancy. I quickly called my assistant and told her that there had to be a mistake somewhere and I needed her to come in and help me find it. I was taken aback by her reply: I think Im pregnant. I cant come in.

I began to suspect that something was wrong. It didnt take long to discover that while I wasnt paying attention, this bright, capable woman had embezzled an enormous amount of money, forging checks to herself and pulling them out of the statements when they came in. Though she didnt go so far as to steal my identity, she had memorized my credit card number and bought herself a computer with it, and had even posed as me to receive the free nutritional counseling that came with my gym membership.