Student Opinion

Can You Spot a Liar?


How good are you at detecting someone else’s lie? Have you heard about the ways professionals can spot a lie when they see one?

Do you know any ways — body language, for example — that are supposed to help you know when another person is lying?

In the Times interactive quiz “Can You Spot the Liar?,” the producers Jeffery DelViscio and Brittany Storoz write:

Poker players might call it the “tell” — it’s the idea that your body language tells your questioners if the words you’re saying are actually true or false. These subjects in a University of Chicago study on body language and lying were asked several general questions — and then told off camera to lie or tell the truth when answering. Can you tell truth from falsehood?

Students: Take the quiz, then tell us:

— How did you do on the quiz? Did you feel confident in detecting the truthtellers from the liars? Why?

— What did you learn about yourself when taking the quiz, if anything, and why?

— How difficult or easy is it to detect a lie? Why did you answer the way you did?

In related Times coverage, see “At Airports, a Misplaced Faith in Body Language.”
