Anastaska 's Key Ideas from Detecting Lies and Deceit
by Aldert Vrij

People tend to underestimate their own ability to lie (Elaad, 2003).

There are several reasons why people think they are worse liars than they actually are. First, they tend to overestimate the extent to which their own thoughts, emotions, and other mental states are transparent to others (e.g., illusion of transparency, Gilovich, Savitsky, & Medvec, 1998). In other words, people mistakenly believe that their lies shine through. Second, self-perceptions are typically characterised by positive illusions (Taylor & Brown, 1988),

and people typically think of themselves as being more moral than most others (Kaplar & Gordon, 2004).

Admitting to being a good liar does not match with this positive self-image. Third, although people tell more white lies than serious lies, they remember their serious lies better than their white lies (Elaad, 2003).