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Introduction
In studying aspects of deception and self-deception there is a general phenomenon that seems to permeate through our culture: everyone deceives to a certain extent. At least this is the consensus of any given group partaking in critical analysis of the subject. For example, when Americans see the latest Gateway commercial and turn around for a glance of there P.C. from the sofa, more times then not they will find their computer is no longer the fastest, despite the fact that it was purchased six months ago. Americans spend millions of dollars each year on upgrades alone. The bite in the ass that comes with this is that 95% of any given computer's capabilities that are on the market today will never be taken advantage of. This means that Americans use 5% of what their computers can do and we still, for some reason, think it is absolutely necessary to install the latest version of Windows.
Advertising and market strategizing are among the most blatant and obvious forms of deception though it can be seen very clearly in other areas as well. When looking into the literature about deception one tends to run across the term "unrealistic optimism" quite often. Shelley Taylor, a psychiatrist who theorizes about deception writes in her book "when people expect to succeed on a task, they work harder than if they doubt their ability to succeed." This idea in part will be the basis of our research and project.
In this study we aim to examine and interpret the human tendency to exaggerate and expand upon one's perception of one's self. We feel that individuals asked to describe traits about themselves will tend to inflate the positive traits and fail to mention possible negative traits in order to make their selves appear more "attractive." We also believe their will be a difference in results form paper anonymous survey's and video surveys. We also believe that there will be a difference between the overall scores of the women and men in this study. While we realize that individuals, most of the time, do not consciously inflate their personas, we believe that the phenomena of deception and self-deception are the leading causes in their compulsion to self-inflate their attributes.
Robert Trivers wrote, "A rigorous study of self-deception that might yield a clear picture of the unconscious mind has yet to arrive." We do not think that it is possible at this time in hstory to identify and define precisely what the unconscious mind is capable of when considering aspects of deception. It seems more likely that, at best, we will be able to support the fact that deception does exist on an unconscious level and definitely on a conscious level (through different ways of interviewing and surveying individuals out of a population).
This brings us to the notion of honesty. Some psychologists will argue that lying cannot take place if it was the result of an unconscious act. Others will say that deception, in any form is dishonest and, therefore, a lie. One philosophical argument stated in the Platonic model is that there is no real truth. Within the realm of Sociology there are theories on sociological ideations. Some claim that truth cannot exist on the basis that we create anything and everything that we choose to be true. Accordingly, we do this as a means of preventing our species from killing itself once we realize we don't actually know anything. We feel that an exaggeration about oneself that results from a motive to mislead another falls under the category of a lie. White lie or dark lie, a lie is a lie. We do not intend to intimidate or accuse. The fact is that people deceive each other and we wish to be the first to admit that we do it too. In our experimental aspect to this project we will be exploiting this phenomenon and expanding on possible explanations of it taking place in our culture.
While we realize this is a hard phenomenon to test scientifically we attempt to test deception and self-deception in this study. We believe that individuals who are given anonymous surveys will inflate their characteristics more than the individuals who take the anonymous surveys. We believe individuals being videotaped will want to make themselves look as good as possible to their audience, while the individuals writing anonymous surveyÕs will not at all be connected to their surveyÕs once they have completed it (so there is really no point in embellishing or lying about their personas).
Relevance: The Literature
Our research question/study is derived from Shelley Taylor's book Positive Illusions. In one chapter Taylor addresses how individuals inflate their personas in order to look better to others. Taylor is quoted saying: The evaluations people offer of themselves are also typically more favorable than judgments made by others about them. For example, when people's descriptions are contrasted with the descriptions of them offered by their friends or acquaintances, the self-descriptions tend to be more positive. Typically we see ourselves in more flattering terms then others see us. The perception of self that most people hold, then, is not as well balanced as traditional theories of mental health suggests. Rather than being attentive to both the favorable and unfavorable aspects of the self, most people appear to be very cognizant of their strengths and assets and considerably less aware of their weaknesses and faults. Our self-aggrandizing perceptions may result in part from biases in how we remember our past actions and ourselves. Taylor asserts to be true what we will be surveying and provides a basis or foundation for the validity of our study. Her book explores a creative aspect to self- deception, implying that while deception is universal and looked upon negatively, it can be seen as positive and helpful as well. She explores the self- concept of children and interprets childhood ideologies relating to grandiose conceptions. This serves as Taylor's link to deception throughout different age groups.
James Korn, Author of Illusions of Reality defines deception by saying that "to deceive means to cause to accept as true what is false or to give false impression." The forms Korn attributes to deception are, to beguile, mislead, delude, and lie. To beguile is to involve charm and persuasion in order to deceive, misleading is to lead astray through intentional or unintentional measures, to delude is to obscure the truth, and to flat out lie is to completely and explicitly mis-state a fact. Deception comes in very different measures; it can occur in mild to very extreme measures, what categorizes deception within these different extremities is the amount of harm caused due to the use of deception (Korn, 4-5).
Korn also states that deception in everywhere in American culture, in fact he goes so far as to state that deception is a characteristic of American culture (Korn, 9). One example of deception in American culture can be seen through political advertising. Everyone in our culture prepares him or herself with the political information they are handed by perceiving that information as false, or distorted which leads to a public distrust of those who have greater control of our country (Korn, 9).
This subject of study is especially interesting because it points toward a causal connection between wanting and believing. The evidence available to an individual concerning deception contrasts greatly with the self-deceiverÕs beliefs. The beliefs often times contain or have to do with an aspect that is desirable, that the deceiver wants but does not have, thus leading to a delusional train in thinking (deception) (Lazar, 19). Donald Davidson asserts that the self-deceived mind is divided into parts; first Davidson claims that self-deception is caused by an intention to form a belief and second the subject self-deceiving holds the rational and irrational belief (Lazar, 20).
Trope, Gervey, and Liberman state:
People have a tendency to see themselves as possessing more positive qualities (e.g.. traits and abilities) than other people and as possessing more positive than negative attributes. For example, in comparison with the average person, most people believe they are smarter and friendlier, possess a better sense of humor, have a more promising future, and are better drivers. The majority of people cannot be above average. Yet they still tend to see themselves that way. Moreover people tend to believe that their futures are even brighter than the present. When asked about what the future holds, one study found that participants listed four times more positive than negatives. (Trope, Gervey, Liberman, 106).
Richard Wiseman, author of Deception and Self-Deception, discusses the phenomena of a large group of today's society who gain reassurance by depending on the guidance of psychic advisors or "friends." One aspect of this practice that makes it interesting is that persons who call a psychic hotline or seek paranormal guidance are told that the calls or sessions are for entertainment purposes only, yet a significant number of them come out and claim that the experience was real and they were able to benefit from it heavily. This can be seen as multiple layers of deception, within the personal and private sphere as well as the larger sphere of our current pop-culture.
Materials and Methods
We conducted our data collection in the form of a paper survey as well as a video survey. Our paper survey questionnaire included personal questions that designated age, sex, place of birth (state/ country), and year in school (or college graduate). The video group also had the same preliminary questions. Both groups were asked to list ten traits that describe their personality. This is the part of the survey we evaluated, using the preliminary questions to compare the groups of females and males. The question concerning the 10 personal characteristics was at the top of the paper, and the rest of the questions were at the bottom of the page, concerning age, sex, student year, or origin. We hypothesized that more than half of the characteristics that were listed would be positive description words rather than those of a critical nature. We videotaped participants in interview style where we asked them the same question posed in the paper survey. We hypothesized that there will be a higher tendency to deceive the interviewer in person then will be in the anonymous survey. What we mean here is that people will list more favorable characteristics about themselves in person than they do in private. If our hypothesis is correct, then it would serve as a possible example for the motivation people have to present themselves in an inflated manner.
For statistical analysis we have comparative graphs and correlation analysis of both the video and paper surveys comparing both, as well as comparing female and males on both surveys. We also made a visual table of all of the traits that where listed in both paper and video surveys. In this chart we have separated the favorable, unfavorable, and neutral or non- categorized characteristics according to how our culture would define them. Our audience consisted of the Miami campus, focusing on students on western and main campus. Our study was executed survey style, where we passed or videotaped 50 surveys in various areas of campus (an even number of video and paper surveys included). We of course asked the class to participate in this survey. It would have been ideal to have a random survey, where we could have actually found a representative sample, but the way we executed the study seems to have been the most practical way to go about it. We executed the same survey technique for the paper surveys and for the video surveys. The survey we gave to the class was the first survey given out, and served as our guinea pig test. We found no initial problems with our survey. We achieved our goal of 50 surveys (paper and video divided evenly); we felt this represented an adequate number of participants to acknowledge any trends or recognize any patterns that could be seen in this group at Miami. The process of surveying lasted about four weeks due to the tedious process of handing out surveys and video-recording participants. After the four-week period we immediately began evaluating the data.
Below we have provided a copy of the survey we chose for the interviews:
Survey: Natural Systems II
List ten traits you feel describe you! -
1._____________________________________
2._____________________________________
3._____________________________________
4._____________________________________
5._____________________________________
6._____________________________________
7._____________________________________
8._____________________________________
9._____________________________________
10.____________________________________
What is your gender?
How old are you?
What state or county are you from?
What year are you in school?
Results (with regards to sexual orientation)
- In computing our data, we chose to use the ÒStatviewÓ program by individually plugging in each answer we received from every participant in our surveys. We categorized them by male/female in both the personal and video surveys and then by overall answers in order to analyze the differences in face-to-face interviews and personal interviews.
- The end results of our data demonstrate that there are some differences in the manner to which male and females chose to answer the surveys. This is demonstrated in the attached pie charts taken from both, the personal survey (conducted on paper) and the face-to-face survey (conducted via video camera). #1(personal), #2(video).
- Notice in #2 the contrast in the number of favorable answers given by females when compared to males. This chart suggests that there exists a tendency among women to recognize their favorable characteristics more so than men.
- Similarly, the same instance can be seen in chart #1, which is important because it leads to suggest one of two things: that women have a higher self-opinion than that of men or women deceive more than men.
- The histograms (#1a, #2a, #3a, #4a) assist in visualizing the same information that the pie charts offer, but they also help in pointing out that the majority of the answers we received were those of positively rooted aspects. This supports the hypothesis that the answers would be mostly favorable rather the unfavorable.
- The answers labeled neutral refer to the characteristics that were found to be neither favorable nor unfavorable. They consisted of statements like ÒI live in Idaho,Ó ÒI have brown hair,Ó etc. Conclusions that we can draw from answers like these are skeptical at best. ItÕs interesting to note that more neutral answers came from the personal surveys rather than the video surveys. This could be interpreted as meaning people feel a need to plug positive sides of themselves when in front of another person. It could also mean that people feel more uncomfortable when taking the personal survey more so than the video interviews (shocking). It could also mean that some of our participants understood that the surveys were more interested in the personality characteristics rather than the physical attributes. The neutral aspect to this survey is intriguing to think about, but it is highly unlikely that any substantial conclusions can be made.
- The final difference with regards to the sexual orientation differences in our study can be seen in the personal survey histogram (#1a). Here, the male responses are notably higher in the unfavorable category of answers. This is interesting because it could symbolize that males are more apt to be self-critical, comparatively, to females. Again, no definitive answers are available for the same reasons mentioned earlier with reference to the manner in which the survey was interpreted and because motives are near impossible to speculate upon.
Results (with regards to response differences in different forms of questioning)
- In figures #5 (and #5a), #6 (and #6a), the personal interviewees are displayed without any emphasis on sexual orientation. Figures #5 and #5a represent the personal surveys while figures #6 and #6a represent the video surveys. The prevailing answers from our survey obviously concur with the notion of our hypothesis that the majority of the answers we received would have positive characteristics rather than negative. The results also support the hypothesis in that more positively noted characteristics were present in the face-to-face interview than in the personal survey. This serves as a possible catalyst for better understanding deception and possible motives for deception. Again, it seems impossible that there can be a study that 100% correctly identifies deception and its presence, but this study does seem to point in that general direction. People want other people to see them at their best even if that means elaborating or exaggerating the way people truly feel about themselves.
- Below is a list of the answers we received in both types of our survey. Recognize that the labeling of these characteristics is highly subjective. We chose to rate them in the fashion that we, personally, feel they could be graded based on our experiences with these characteristics. We recognize that there could be discrepancies in our rating scale and chose to make them available in the context of our study so the individual could test the validity of our project based on personal assumption.
Characteristic Traits from Surveys
Paper Survey Video Survey
Favorable
Academic-1
Adventurous
Agile
Appreciative
Artistic- 2
Athletic- 2
Attractive (Physically)- 12
Calm- 2
Capable
Caring- 2
Confident
Considerate
Creative- 3
Delightful
Easy going- 3
Eclectic
Emotionally Stable
Energetic
Entertaining
Excited
Exuberant
Feminine
Friendly- 3
Funny - 11
Generous
Good
Good listener- 2
Good Speller
Happy- 2
Hardworking
Helpful
Herculean
Honest-5
Hopeful- 2
Humble
Independent- 3
Intelligent/Perspicacious/Smart-13
Interesting- 2
Loyal-4
Munificent
Muscular
Nice - 5
Objectable
Open-minded-4
Out-going- 3
Patient- 2
Peaceful
Prosperous
Responsible-3
Self-deserving
Silly- 2
Smart
Social
Strong
Superior
Thoughtful
Trusting
Trustworthy
Understanding
Wise
Young
Favorable
Able
Animated
Athletic
Caring- 4
Charismatic
Compassionate- 2
Creative
Cute
Decent
Diligent
Early
Easy-going
Emotional
Enthusiastic
Excitable
Excited
Fashionable
Friendly- 5
Fun- 4
Fun-loving- 3
Funny- 3
Gentle
Good listener
Good-natured
Go-to-guy
Happy- 2
Hard-working- 3
Honest- 5
Humorous- 2
In love
Intelligent- 8
Interesting
Laid-back
Likeable
Loving- 2
Motivated
Neat
Nice- 3
Not arrogant
Not Quick to Anger
Organized
Outgoing- 2
Outspoken
Positive
Precious
Relaxed
Sensitive
Sexy
Silly- 3
Social
Strong
Studious
Sweet
Talented
Thoughtful
Tough
Trustworthy
Truthful
Well-read
Western
Witty
Wonderful
Unfavorable
Addicted
Anxious
Busy
Clutsy-1
Confused- 2
Crazy- 5
Cryptic
Cynical
Daft
Deceiving
Dirty
Disagreeing
Dramatic
Dumb
Eager
Elitist
Failing
Fat
Frustrated
Hairy
Hegemonic
Impulsive
Irresponsible
Irritated
Lazy
Lonely- 2
Loose
Loud- 2
Malicious
Moody
Nervous
Oblivious
Over-indulgent
Paradoxical
Passive
Perfectionist
Pessimistic
Procrastinator- 2
Reactionary
Sad
Sarcastic
Self-Conscious
Selfish
Shy- 2
Sloppy
Smelly- 2
Starving
Strange
Tired-5
Ugly
Uncoordinated
Unfashionable
Unimaginative
Unshaven
Weird-2
Worried
Unfavorable
Stressed
Tired
Stressed
Forgetful
Absent-minded
Not innocent
Arrogant
Not Cheery
Misogynist
Western Sucks
Angsty
Lazy
Procrastinator
Not Social
Not a good listener
Over-thinks
Selfish
Self- centered
Insecure
Scared
Fearful
Lonely
Sad
Stupid
Boring
Fruity
Not nice
Sarcastic
Bitchy
Procrastinator
Neutral (NON-Categorized)
Afrotastic
Blonde
Breathing
Bum
Curious
Emotional-2
Everquest Dominator
Family Oriented
Frugal-gourmet
Full of Shit
Goth
Grassy
Heavy drinker
Hedonistic
Introverted
Liberal- 2
Living
Nature-Constituent
Non-political
Out-doors type
Private
Prone to long Projects
Quiet
Quiet
Religious
Self-Contained
Serious- 1
Short-4
Simple
Single
Smelling
Smoker
Stimulate-able
Tactile
Tall
Tall
Tall
Tall
The Shit!
Transitory
Unknown
Yeah
Neutral (NON-Categorized)
5' 3''
Blonde Hair
Brown eyes
Brown hair
From NY
Fruity- 2
Full of Shit
Hairy
Hard
Has twin sister
Hungry
Jewish
Likes alcohol
Likes cheese
Likes pictures
Likes Sports
Likes Stuff
Likes to cook
Likes to Eat
Likes Video Games- 2
Muslim
Sarge
Short
Smoker- 3
Spastic
Tall
Tired
Conclusion
In attaining our data it seems that it would have been more helpful for our research if we had chosen to ask for characteristics that did not pertain to physical appearance or material objects that are owned (like a dog). This would have helped in greatly reducing the amount of ÒneutralÓ data. Also, we think that it would be more beneficial to take into account the obstacles that we came across and try adjusting a study around those obstacles so more specific conclusions can be made. In the case of gauging the human propensity to inflate the ways in which they view themselves in front of others for the sake of appearing more confident, likeable, etc., it seems that our study, though strong in many ways, fails at isolating the phenomenon in a sense so as to provide conclusive evidence.
However, the information that was collected definitively verifies that people say more good things about themselves than bad. This correlates with much of the literature mentioned previously in the project and serves to reinforce those assertions. The Òred tapeÓ in our study comes about when we find that, even with the evidence we collected, it is very difficult to link the motives to answers, after all correlation does not mean causation. This leads us to believe that only assumptions can be made about the percentages that people act in a deceptive/ self-deceptive manner. Perhaps a larger sample group would help to demonstrate the presence of deception/ self-deception more clearly.
In addition to a larger sample group, it would be helpful if there were a way to recognize brain-wave patterns that occur when someone is acting in a deceptive manner. This would open up a whole new window for testability and study for study of self-deception. The idea comes from the uses associated with a polygraph machine. Only, it seems that data could be very shaky at best if participants were hooked up and experienced the stress of such a machine. Perhaps in the near future similar tests could be done with out the use of such an intimidating machine.
Also, the subjectivity of our rating system is highly questionable. We did not foresee this as an issue, but upon receiving and inputting the data, it became clear that different people might rate this project differently, therefore skewing the data, even though it is the same information. Thus far, we see no way of conducting a study of deception- self-deception that is not subject to scrutiny resulting from value-based assumptions.
Figure #1 Figure #1a
Figure #2 Figure #2a
* Figures #1-#2a are taken from the personal interview.
Figure #3 Figure #3a
Figure #4 Figure #4a
* Figures #3-#4a are taken from the video interview.
Figure #5
Figure #5a
* Figures #5-#5a are taken from all participants in the personal interviews.
Figure #6
Figure #6a
* Figures #6-#6a are taken from all participants in the video interview.
Bibliography
Gervey, Benjamin, and Nira Liberman, et. al. ÒWishful Thinking from a Pragmatic
Hypothesis- Testing Perspective.Ó The Mythomanias: The Nature of Deception and Self-Deception. Michael S. Myslobodsky, ed. Mahwah, NJ; Lawrence Erlbaum Assoiciates, Publishers, 1997.
Giannetti, Eduardo. Lies We Live By: The Art of Self- Deception.
New York; Bloomsbury, 1997.
Hausman, Carl. Lies We Live By: Defeating Double-Talk and Deception
In Advertising, Politics, and the Media. New York; Routledge, 2000.
Korn, James H. Illusions of Reality: A History of Deception in Social
Psychology. Albany; State University of New York Press, 1997.
Lazar, Ariela. ÒDivision and Deception: Davidson on Being Self-Deceived.Ó Self
Deception and Paradoxes of Rationality. Jean-Pierre Dupuy, ed. Stanford, CA; CSLI Publications, 1998.
Robinson, W. Peter. Deceit, Delusion, and Detection. London; Sage Publications, 1996.
Taylor, Shelly. Positive Illusions: Creative Self-Deception and the Healthy Mind. New
York: Basic Books, 1989.
Wiseman, Richard. Deception and Self-Deception: Investigating Psychics. Amherst,N.Y.;
Prometheus Books, 1997.
Wright, Robert. Moral Animal: Evolutionary Psychology and Everyday Life. New York;
Vintage Books,1994.
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