Lie‐biased Decision Making in Prison

Abstract

Levine and McCornack (1992) found that persons who have a truth‐bias (those who tend to believe that most messages are truthful) exhibit low detection accuracy, that moderately suspicious people are more accurate at detecting, and suggested that lie‐bias persons would be as inaccurate at detecting lies as those who are truth‐biased. This study tested Levine and McCornack’s suggestion that lie‐biased people would be inaccurate deception detectors by conducting field experiments in Kansas and New Mexico prisons. Results indicate that prisoners are lie‐biased and are accurate detectors of lies but not truths, and findings suggest a reversed veracity effect in prison.

Keywords:

• Lie‐bias
• Context
• Prison
• Deception
• Reversed Veracity Effect

Notes

[1] A prisoner dyad at Southern New Mexico Correctional Facility consented to record an open‐ended discussion related to deception and suspicion in the prison context.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Gary D. Bond

The authors would like to extend their appreciation to the state Secretaries of Correction in Kansas and in New Mexico for their approvals allowing this research to be conducted. The authors would like to thank the New Mexico Department of Corrections; Tia Bland, Chief Public Information Officer, Santa Fe, NM; SNMCF Warden Lawrence Tafoya; Lupe Martinez‐Marshall, Warden of the SNMCF Paul Oliver Unit; SNMCF Mental Health Director Kathleen Hodges, Las Cruces, NM; the Kansas Department of Corrections; Ken Shirley, Research Analyst at Kansas Department of Corrections; and David McKune, Warden at LCF, Lansing, KS. We would also like to extend our appreciation to the many correctional officers and staff members who provided assistance to us, and to the prisoners and students for their effortful participation. This research was partially supported by a NIH NIGMS pilot grant S06M08136, and a NIH MBRS‐RISE Grant GM61222.