Abstract
The aim was to examine how people mentally represent alleged future actions—their true and false intentions. In two experiments, participants were asked to either tell the truth (i.e., express true intentions) or lie (i.e., express false intentions) about performing future tasks. Drawing on Construal Level Theory, which proposes that psychologically distant events are more abstractly construed than proximal ones, it was predicted that liars would have more abstract mental representations of the future tasks than truth tellers, due to differences in hypotheticality (i.e., the likelihood of the future tasks occurring). Construal level was measured by a video segmentation task (Experiment 1, N = 125) and preference for abstract or concrete descriptions of tasks (Experiment 2, N = 59). Veracity had no effect on construal level. Speaking against our initial predictions, the data indicate that true and false intentions are construed at similar levels of abstraction. The results are discussed in the light of Construal Level Theory and the emerging psycho-legal research on true and false intentions.
Highlights
All situations which are not directly experienced are cognitively represented in some form
Failing to support the predictions, the results indicate that true and false intentions are mentally represented at similar levels of abstraction
The results from Experiment 2 showed that manipulating true and false intention within subjects did not alter their level of representation of a series of tasks
Summary
All situations which are not directly experienced are cognitively represented in some form. Construal Level Theory (CLT) provides a framework for understanding how such representations are construed (Trope and Liberman, 2010). CLT proposes that peoples’ mental representations differ in systematic and predictable ways, from higher-level, abstract construals to lower-level, concrete construals. Since credibility judgments of verbal statements play a central role in many applied settings, it is crucial to understand the mental representations on which such statements are based. As will be explained below, theory and empirical research indicate that there should be differences in how true and false intentions are mentally represented. This can provide one potential route to aid in the task of discriminating between true and false intentions in real life legal situations
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