9 Scientific Ways To Tell When Someone Is Lying

6. They'll Use "Minimal Self Referencing"

One of the more striking linguistic clueswhen someone is telling whoppers is that their use of personal pronouns will go through the floor.

Listen to the way people talk most of the time and you'll notice that we use the words "I" and "me" with almost nauseating frequency. However, when a person is lying, their language will suddenly become impersonal.This is them subconsciously distancing themselves from the lie.

They might also tell the tale from another person's point of view, something that is pretty uncommon amongst truth tellers. In a (probably apocryphal) motor insurance claim, a man described his accident like this:

"The telephone pole was approaching. I was attempting to swerve out of the way when I struck the front end."

Notice that the telephone pole was the active participant in that sentence, not the dude running into it. Now, this person wasn't completely lyingper se, but theyweresubconsciously attempting to misrepresent what happened.

Now, in full-blown fibbers this might be even more prominent. They might switch completely from first person ("I didn't kill your fish") to second person ("you don't kill other people's fish") or even third person ("people don't kill other people's fish"). Thisremoves the liar from the equation altogether in an attempt to divert attention away from them.