“Although there are some ways in which liars behave differently from truth-tellers, there are no perfectly reliable cues to deception,” admits DePaulo, author of more than a dozen deception studies. “Cues to deception differ according to factors such as the type of lie and the motivation for getting away with it.”

While there is no surefire on-the-spot way to sniff out dissemblers, there are some helpful tactics for uncovering untruths.

Thus, with the caveat that nothing said is reliable, Lindner nonetheless provides answers.

1. Liars often give short or one-word responses to questions, while truth tellers are more likely to flesh out their answers.
   
2. Skilled liars don’t break a sweat, but the rest of us get a little fidgety. Four possible giveaways: shifty eyes, higher vocal pitch, perspiration and heavier breathing.
   
3. Liars are often reluctant to admit ordinary storytelling mistakes. When honest people tell stories, they may realize partway through that they left out some details and would unselfconsciously backtrack to fill in holes.
   
4. To psychologically distance themselves from a lie, people often pepper their tales with second- and third-person pronouns like “you,” “we” and “they.”
   
5. Liars are also more likely to ask that questions be repeated and begin responses with phrases like, “to tell you the truth,” and “to be perfectly honest.”
   
6. When telling the truth, people often make hand gestures to the rhythm of their speech. Hands emphasize points or phrases–a natural and compelling technique when they actually believe the points they’re making.
   
7. Truthful people more likely to face her questioners head on. Liars, on the other hand, are”likely to lack frontal alignment and will often sit with both their arms and legs crossed as if frozen,”
   
8. Liars are more likely to ask that questions be repeated.
   
9. Liars–amateur ones, anyway–may not have thought through all the particulars of their stories.
   
10. When a person is lying, the gaps between their words often increase,

Yes, I know the list doesn’t add up to 11, but neither did hers so don’t blame me. 

Aside from the obvious, the point of Lindner’s caveat that none of these “rules” necessarily means someone is lying, what is striking about it is its reflection of witnesses at trial, particularly given how lawyers typically prepare and instruct witnesses to testify.  For those who are shocked that lawyers prepare witnesses to testify, grow up.  Only an idiot would put a normal human being on the witness stand, perhaps the most peculiar seat in the world, without preparing them. 

This doesn’t mean we tell them what to say, but rather how to comport themselves, deal with the pressure of having at least two dozen eyeballs on them, address the situation and deal with the typical issues that arise.  There’s nothing nefarious about it.  If you think this is disingenuous, consider that police must go through a course at the Academy on testifying in their training, far more extensive and structured than anything a lawyer could provide.  That’s why the cops are so much better at it.

Amongst Lindner’s “liar rules” are numerous specifics that we, lawyers, instruct our clients and witness in anticipation of testimony.  We tell them to listen to the question and answer it in the fewest possible words, particularly “yes” or “no” if possible.  We tell them to ask to have the question repeated if they aren’t clear.  He tell them not to add in collateral details, but simple answer the question as directly and clearly as possible.

Sitting on the witness stand is an enormous pressure cooker, with normal people pushed to their stress limit.  Put an unpracticed witness on the stand and the fear that some facile questioning will take an honest person and turn him into a lying scuzzball permeates his thinking.  Added to the mix are the consequences of the word, each and every one potentially resulting in conviction if poorly chosen or imprecise.  Minds race to figure out why a question is being asked, and what pitfalls any particular answer will bring.  Doubt rages as to whether anyone will accept the truth, particularly when someone earlier told a perfectly reasonable story in a calm, cool manner, that was utterly false. 

When it comes to the witness stand, all Lindner’s rules go out the window.  In fact, the very opposite may be true, where these very same rules reflect the truthful witness rather than the liar, given the shift in situation and the nature of the humans under stress.  Yet here we have another publication instructing people how to tell if someone is lying.  This is a problem.

What’s peculiar is the extent to which Lindner seeks to clarify her “rules” by the numerous caveats that they are hardly conclusive or reliable.  Why give “rules”, and why call them “rules”, if they are unreliable?  Aside from it making decent enough fodder for an article, the exculpatory caveat does little to clarify, since readers will remember the rules and ignore the boring equivocation.  After all, rules make things simple, and people like simple things like rules to tell if someone is lying.  The only problem, of course, is that the “rules” illuminate nothing and feed the simpleton’s belief that there is some magic to distinguishing truth from lies.

There is, of course, good news and bad news here.  The good news is that few, if any, jurors read Forbes Magazine, the Capitalists Tool.  They are far too busy trying to keep their bonuses to serve on a jury.  The bad news is that they regularly read the New York Post, which informs them that cops are always right and anyone arrested is guilty anyway.