9. Positive Emotions Are Easier to Fake Than Negative Ones

“Men lie, women lie, numbers don’t,” the illustrious rapper and businessman Jay Z rhymes in his 2009 single, Reminder .

The honest-to-God truth is that everybody lies. And the reasons for lying are varied. Some lies are told to get out of trouble, others are told to make ...

Ever heard that someone lies so much they start to believe their lies too? Well, it looks like that’s true.

It may seem obvious to others that people who cheat and boast of their capabilities are lying, b...

he previous fact about beards being men’s version of makeup? Well, that applies here—somewhat.

It appears people find it difficult to lie to those they’re physically attracted to. A study on ingratiating lies found it was easier to spot...

The latter doesn’t try to mask their behavior with a false emotion and hence blink slower.

This may sound contradictory to what you’ve just read in the previous fact.

People who try to lie tend to blink at a different rate. Those trying to be deceptive by masking their emotions with...

Before you get too excited, this is not carte blanche to lie compulsively.

Let’s delve into biology a little bit. People’s brains have a region called the prefrontal cortex, which is responsible for intellect and reasoning. People who lie all the time (i.e., compulsive liars) have significa...

You may think of a liar as a terrible, menacing person, but the truth is that sometimes the situation calls for it. This is especially true when a quick decision has to be made.

Liars in this situation find it inconvenient to consider the ramifications of lying, so they lie or

People tend to believe or trust men with beards more than their clean-shaven counterparts. This is because they appear to have more charisma and honestly look more dependable.

With people less likely to believe ...

You probably know that lying and cheating go against what you’ve been taught about moral conduct. To ease the moral conflict, you forget “the rules” about honesty.

In fact, people who cheat have sel...

As much as everybody lies, it’s behavior that doesn’t come naturally to people.

The same study referred to earlier found that 100% of the participants experienced emotional leakage, even when asked to hide how they were truly feeling. This demonstrates that lying doesn’t come naturally to ...

Americans tell about four lies on average per day. But come January, the number increases to seven lies per day. “Why?” you may ask. Well, it turns out people lie about their plans to lose weight after the holidays, how their holidays were, and what they did on vacation. Interesting, huh?

Men usually lie to make themselves look better, whereas women lie to make others feel good about themselves.

It’s not hard ...

While it’s difficult to determine if someone’s being dishonest by their eye movements, it appears that moving a different part of your body is what helps to conceal this.

Early on in evolution, humans had to work well together to survive, so it makes sense that lying evolved this way.

Sadly, a great way to cooperate with others is to lie to them about your true intentions. Being strategically dishonest and misrepresenting facts to another person may help a ...

Time to gear up and find out some uncomfortable truths about lying.

You’d think that since most people aren’t good at lying, then you’d be able to spot someone being deceptive, right? Unfortunately, that’s not the case. The same study that revealed that people are terrible liars also showed that the observers weren’t good at detecting lies.

Interestingly, ...

Everybody lies. But what is it that causes people to lie? No need to worry, as psychology has lots to say about lying.

This common human behavior is not always done for malicious purposes. In ...

This may shock you, but there isn’t a lie detector that’s 100% reliable.

Seeing that lie detector tests essentially measure your stress and anxiety levels, these can be fooled by a calm, cool, and collected liar.

It’s not that lying or cheating will unleash your inner Picasso or J. K. Rowling. It’s that the characteristics of cheating are comparable to those of creativity.

These are breaking rules and the need to step outside one’s comfort zone, and the acts of lying or cheating may temporarily ins...

Similar to people being bad at detecting lies, you probably aren’t good at detecting lies based on someone’s eye s. In fact, a typical lie you might believe is that someone lying to you wouldn’t be able to look you di...

On average, Americans lie at least once or twice a day. Of these self-professed liars, more than 50 percent of them (56%, to be precise) believe they can get away with it.

People lie a lot more in written communication compared to in-person communication. Highly ranked among the top modes of lying are emails, followed by chats or text messages. Last is lying in person.

This makes sense, as you don’t have to worry about your body language when writing. Plus, ...

People change up their words when being dishonest.

Liars use fewer, shorter words when telling tales. In fact, because lying takes a psychological toll, you must use your brain power efficiently. 

This means liars direct most of their brain power toward coming up with a good lie. Us...

Lying stresses people out, no doubt. So it stands to reason that lying isn’t good for your physical well-being.

Yes, the truth hurts. But it’ll set you free—from ill health, that is.

So although lying requires a lot of brainpower (which is why you use fewer, shorter words when lying), compulsive liars may be able to handle the energy required to lie all the time. Yikes .

Compulsively lying may be stress-inducing and possibly