Letizia Caso

A World of Lies

This article reports two worldwide studies of stereotypes about liars. These studies are carried out in 75 different countries and 43 different languages. In Study 1, participants respond to the open-ended question “How can you tell when people are lying?” In Study 2, participants complete a questionnaire about lying. These two studies reveal a dominant pan-cultural stereotype: that liars avert gaze. The authors identify other common beliefs and offer a social control interpretation.

Deceptive responses: the impact of verbal and non-verbal countermeasures

Objectives. This experiment investigates the impact of informing participants about verbal and non‐verbal cues to deception on their verbal and non‐verbal responses. Based on the fact that people are more practised in their verbal behaviour than in their non‐verbal behaviour, we predicted that giving participants information about verbal cues would positively affect their verbal accounts resulting in them giving an account that appeared more credible. In contrast, we predicted that informing participants about non‐verbal cues would have no noticeable effect on credibility. We also predicted that focusing on verbal behaviours would impair non‐verbal performance and that, vice versa, concentrating on non‐verbal behaviours would impair verbal performance, particularly in liars. Method. A total of 128 participants either told the truth or lied about the possession of an object. Prior to these interviews, participants were or were not informed about verbal cues to deception and were or were not informed about non‐verbal cues of deception (these two factors were systematically manipulated). Results. As predicted, participants were able to adapt their verbal behaviour but were not able to change their non‐verbal behaviour. However, focusing on one aspect (either verbal or non‐verbal behaviour) did not occur at the expense of the other behaviour (either non‐verbal or verbal). Conclusion. Verbal countermeasures may well be easier to apply than non‐verbal countermeasures.

La suggestionabilità interrogativa nei bambini: una ricerca sperimentale sull'influenza dell'età e dell'autorevolezza dell'intervistatore

The impact of age (6-8 years to 9-11 years old children), and authoritativeness (absent/present) on Gudjonsson Suggestibility Scale (GSS2) scores was examined. The GSS2 has been administered to 147 children aged between 6 and 12. The subjects were divided into 2 age groups and were randomly assigned to two conditions of interview: the first one followed the standard procedure of administration, while in the second one, the interviewer took on an authoritative role. The analysis shows that the interviewers authoritativeness influences weakly childrens suggestibility, while the age influences their tendency to yield to the suggestive questions, and also their total suggestibility.

La violenza assistita intrafamiliare. Uno studio qualitativo sui fattori di rischio e di protezione nei minori vittime

La ricerca si pone come finalita l’approfondimento della conoscenza sul fenomeno della violenza assistita intrafamiliare, attraverso lo studio dei fattori di rischio e di protezione dei minori testimoni. La metodologia riguarda l’analisi qualitativa del contenuto delle interviste somministrate ad un gruppo di 24 madri vittime di violenza domestica, che risiedono in una struttura protetta. I principali risultati emersi si riferiscono all’associazione percepita, in termini di fattori di rischio, tra l’esordio delle violenze in famiglia ed eventi quali la gravidanza o la nascita di un figlio, il rapporto tra la vittimizzazione diretta e l’esposizione alla violenza e l’incidenza della diversa appartenenza culturale dei partner sull’insorgenza della violenza. Tra i principali fattori di protezione vi sono l’autonomia professionale ed economica delle madri e il supporto della rete sociale.