Deception Detection

ACTIVITIES

Have students get in small groups with people they don't know. Each student should come up with two "fun facts" about themselves that are true and one that is a lie. It's the job of the other students in the group to determine which fun fact is a lie.
1. This activity can be as quick or in depth as you would like. Some variations include
  1. (1) Have students tell you what cues they used to detect their classmates' deception. They will likely primarily list nonverbal cues and you can use this to jump start a discussion about stereotypes about liars and lead into a review of the research on cues to deception
  2. (2) Calculate accuracy rates - they should be around chance. You can use this to start a discussion about why people are terrible lie detectors, cues to deception, or really anything deception related
  3. (3) Type up directions for different students: have some focus on nonverbal behavior, have some focus on verbal behavior, allow others to chose their own strategy. You can then calculate accuracy rates for the different subgroups and us that to start discussion/dive into the research.

- Use videos from the game show to To Tell the Truth to jump start discussion/dive into the research (see above). Note: you'll want to watch the videos ahead of time, some or the more recent ones are a little "R rated" or just plain obvious who is lying

The Interrogation Room - The Reid Technique
- "In a fifth estate exclusive, we show how Peel Regional Police used this controversial method to convince, not suspects, but several murder witnesses, that they had not seen what they thought they had."

***All of these articles can be assigned to read before class to jump start class discussion.