Forget eye contact, this is the real sign someone’s lying, says psychologist
We all like to think we can tell when someone is bluffing or being less than truthful. But according to a senior psychologist, the signs are often far more subtle than the stereotypes suggest and the behaviours most of us rely on may not work at all.
Live Casinos has partnered with Dr Sasha Hall, Senior Educational Psychologist, to reveal the most persistent myths about spotting a bluffer, and to reveal what the evidence actually says is worth paying attention to.
The eye contact myth
Avoiding eye contact is probably the single most widely believed “lie detector” cue there is. According to Dr Hall, it’s also one of the least reliable.
“People often rely on popular ideas about body language, such as avoiding eye contact or fidgeting, but these behaviours can occur for many different reasons. Someone might be tired, anxious, distracted or simply thinking carefully about their answer.”
The same applies to fidgeting, touching the face or shifting position. All of these can have entirely innocent explanations — and someone who maintains strong eye contact isn’t necessarily telling the truth, either.
What to look for instead: a change from someone’s baseline
Rather than hunting for a single giveaway gesture, Dr Hall says the more reliable signal is a shift away from someone’s own normal communication style.
“When people think about bluffing, they picture someone with a completely blank face. In reality it’s far more nuanced than that. Everyone has their own natural communication style — some people are highly expressive, others are far more reserved, and neither is inherently more convincing. What actually gives people away is a change from their own baseline.”
Four things to watch for
Once you know someone’s normal communication style, Dr Hall says these are the shifts worth paying attention to:
Pace of speech: a normally fast talker suddenly slowing down, or a measured speaker starting to rush, particularly around a specific question or topic.
Level of detail: sudden over-explaining, or a noticeable drop-off in how forthcoming someone is, relative to their usual pattern.
How animated they are: an expressive person becoming unusually restrained, or a quiet person suddenly becoming animated.
Engagement with others: becoming withdrawn, unusually attentive, or responding differently than usual when challenged.
Why we’re worse at spotting lies than we think
“Most of us like to think we would know if somebody was lying to us. The evidence suggests we are generally not as accurate as we believe.”
Dr Hall says the mistake most people make is treating one behaviour, a glance away, a pause, a fidget as proof of deception, when in reality it’s the overall pattern that matters.
“It is much more useful to understand a person’s usual communication style before trying to interpret whether anything has changed. Without that context, it is very easy to read meaning into behaviours that may be entirely typical for that individual.”
Five things to remember when trying to spot a bluffer
1. Know their baseline: Understand how they normally speak, move and respond before interpreting anything unusual.
2. Look for changes: A sudden shift in pace, detail, animation or engagement may be more informative than a behaviour that’s typical for that person.
3. Don’t treat eye contact as a lie detector: Looking away can mean many things, including thinking, anxiety or distraction.
4. Consider multiple behaviours together: One gesture or expression rarely tells the whole story.
5. Keep context in mind: Stress, tiredness, nerves and the subject of a conversation can all change someone’s behaviour without deception being involved.
Whether you’re trying to work out if someone is bluffing in a game, giving an excuse, avoiding a difficult question, or simply not being completely forthcoming, the key isn’t becoming an expert in body language. It’s paying attention to patterns and changes.
