2. Lying
3. Fact About Deception

Top Ten Things to Know about Deception, Love and Romance

We’ve compiled a Top Ten List of the research findings on lying in romantic relationship.

1. Deception can be achieved one of two ways:
• Directly, by explicitly saying things which are not true
• Indirectly, by leaving out critical information (part of the who, what, where, when, why or how).
2. People prefer telling indirect lies, especially in close relationships.
• Telling Indirect Lies makes people feel both less guilty and less accountable.
• But, if discovered, the partner who has been misled does not see it that way.
3. Lying is an automatic response designed to protect the self from harm.
• Most deception occurs with little awareness or thought.
• People overestimate how honest they are and they underestimate their use of deception.
• People repeat the same lies so often; they actually begin to believe what they are saying.
4. All the evidence indicates that deception is an inherent and necessary aspect of our close relationships—also see, why lovers lie.
• Ironically, people are both more honest and more deceptive with those they love.
• Lying is not a luxury, but it a necessity. Our relationships are held together by both telling the truth and lying.
5. Lying is a relational dynamic.
• You can do things to increase or decrease a partner’s use of deception.
6. People save their biggest and most serious lies for those they love.
• People are very good at using deception; children start lying at age 3 and people continue using deception throughout their lives.
7. Love is blind People are easily fooled by someone they love.
• People are more susceptible to the lies of a lover than the lies of a stranger.
• People do not like to acknowledge this.
8. Most deception is successful; it never gets detected.
• Despite popular belief, there are no reliable nonverbal cues of deception.
• People cannot detect deception better than flipping a coin, but everyone thinks they can.
• Training does little, if anything, to improve one’s ability to detect deception.
• Professionals cannot consistently detect deception better than anyone else.
• Most deception gets discovered by accident.

9. When it comes to matters of deception, love and romance, people like to think they are different from everyone else, but this is typically not the case.

10. People, not only lie to their loved ones, but they lie to themselves, especially about their use of deception.

Related Information:

• quotes about lying, love and infidelity
• lying and deception – articles, links and resources

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