US police officers’ knowledge regarding behaviors indicative of deception: Implications for eradicating erroneous beliefs through training

Abstract

The current study surveyed a random sample of Texas law enforcement officers (n = 109) about their knowledge regarding behaviors indicative of deception. The officers were not highly knowledgeable about this topic, overall performing at a chance level in assessing how various behavioral cues relate to deception. Confidence in one's skill was unrelated to accuracy, and officers who reported receiving the most training and utilizing these skills more often were more confident but no more accurate in their knowledge of the behaviors that typically betray deception. The authors compare these results to previous studies that have examined officers’ beliefs in other countries and discuss the implication of these results in terms of developing future training programs that may debunk the common misconceptions that officers possess.

Keywords:

• Detecting deception
• police officers
• beliefs about deception

Notes

1. A fourth section gathered extensive information regarding officers’ history of training in detecting deception, the results of which are reported elsewhere (Colwell, Miller, Lyons, & Miller, in press).

2. A complete listing of these behavioral cues is provided in Table III.