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SALT LAKE CITY — Getting your pants set on fire may not be the only problem you will have if you lie.
Researchers Anita E. Kelly, Ph.D. and Lijuan Wang, Ph.D. just finished conducting a 10-week experiment with 110 participants, and their findings suggest that lies can have adverse effects on relationships and health. The “Science of Honesty” study has not yet been peer reviewed, but was presented at the American Psychological Association’s annual convention Aug. 4.
The researchers defined a lie as “an assertion, the content of which the speaker believes to be false, which is made with the intention to deceive the hearer with respect to that content,” and found, by that definition, that Americans lie one to two times a day, or 11 times a week.
The researchers found that Americans lie one to two times a day, or 11 times a week.
Study participants were divided into two groups: a control group and a “no-lie group asked to refrain from telling any lies for any reason to anyone” throughout the week. They were told they could omit truths, refuse to answer and keep secrets, but not say anything they knew to be false.
Each participant was hooked up to a polygraph machine during the study sessions, during which researchers asked both the control and “no-lie” groups questions about the lies they told that week. For data collection, both groups were asked how many white lies and major lies they told that week, rated themselves on their honesty and were also asked about their personal relationships.
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NAB Credit Cards in Australia went great lengths — no, extreme lengths — to reward the honest among us. They set up a whole scheme in a mall to highlight average people who happen to do the right thing. Watch the video to see how it went.Over the course of 10 weeks, participants in the no-lie group reported that they told three fewer white lies than in previous weeks, experienced fewer mental-health and physical-health complaints, and viewed themselves as more honest people than they were before the study began. They also reported that personal relationships improved, which previous studies have clearly linked to overall better health.
“We suggest that not violating others’ expectations for honesty is likely to build trust, which may be key to good health through building good relationships,” Kelly wrote. “Not allowing oneself to lie might change behaviors that would have to be lied about later, too.”
