Verbal, Facial, and Paralinguistic Cues to the Detection of Truth and Lying

Abstract

Edited videotaped segments of the television program "To Tell the Truth" were presented to 47 female and 34 male students who judged truthfulness of contestants. The modes of information presented to subjects were manipulated by presenting different edited tapes to create four conditions: (1) total information, including facial, verbal content, and paralinguistic cues, (2) verbal and paralinguistic cues, (3) facial and verbal content, (4) facial cues. Results indicated that concurrent deletion of verbal content and paralinguistic cues led to decreased accuracy, while deletion of only facial cues or paralinguistic cues did not affect accuracy.