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In Stein, N.L., Ornstein, P.A., Tversky, B., & Brainerd, C. (1997) Memory for Everyday and
Emotional Events. Mahwah, New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers.
Chapter 14
LYING AND DECEPTION
Paul Ekman
University of California, San Francisco
Questions about truthfulness occur in many contexts—when parents ask their children if
they are using recreational drugs, when an employer ask applicants about the reasons they left
their last job, when international leaders consider each others’ threats or promises, when
voters evaluate candidates’ promises, when physicians consider a patient’s complaint, when at
the start of a romantic encounter claims about the number of prior sexual partners are
evaluated, and when juries evaluate witness testimony. In all of these instances many sources
of information are used to evaluate whether someone is being truthful. My focus here has
solely been on those judgments that are based on a person’s demeanor.
Before I turn to this, I first explain my definition of lying and how I distinguish lies from
secrets, self-deception, and other kinds of deceit. I then discuss some of the difficulties in
using that definition, when people believe what is false to be true. Next I consider the
different motives that underlie the decision to tell a lie. I then discuss two principal reasons
why lies fail and close by reviewing some of our most recent research on how difficult it is to
judge whether someone is lying or telling the truth.1
1

Much of what I cover has been published in the second edition of Telling Lies (Ekman, 1992) or in articles listed
in the reference section of this chapter. An exception is new distinctions between concealment lies and secrets I
introduce in the first section of this chapter.

LYING AND SELF-DECEPTION
The intent of the liar is one of the two criteria for distinguishing lies from other kinds of
deception. The liar deliberately chooses to mislead the target. Liars may actually tell the truth,
but that is not their intent. Truthful people may provide false information—bad advice may
come from stockbrokers—but that is not their intent. The liar has choice; the liar could choose
not to lie. Presumably, a pathological liar is compelled to lie and, by my definition, therefore
is not a liar.
The second criterion for distinguishing lies from other deceptions is that the target is not
notified about the liar’s intention to mislead. A magician is not a liar by this criterion, but Uri
Geller is a liar, because Geller claimed his tricks were not magic. An actor is not a liar but an
impostor is. Sometimes notification of an intention to mislead is implicit in the framing, to use
Goffman’s (1974) term, of the situation. Let the buyer beware is one example of an explicit
warning that products or services may not be what they are purported. (Of course, that
warning does not appear in advertisements, nearly all of which are designed to convey the
opposite message.) In real estate transactions, the potential buyer is implicitly notified that the
seller’s asking price is not the actual price the seller would accept. Various forms of politeness
are other instances in which the nature of the situation notifies the target that the truth may not
be spoken. The host would not properly scrutinize the dinner guest to determine if the guest’s
claim to have enjoyed the evening is true anymore than the aunt should worry whether the

nephew is lying when he says that he appreciated being given a tie for Christmas. Deception is
expected; even if the target might suspect that the truth is not being told it is improper to
question it. Poker is still another situation in which the rules of the game sanction and notify
the players that deception will occur, and therefore one can not consider bluffing to be a lie. In
some situations only certain types of deception are allowable. The poker player cannot use
marked cards, nor can the home seller conceal a known defect.
Courtship is probably an ambiguous sit...

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