Many lies may start off being insignificant, but they can turn out to be huge problems, affecting people’s lives, even well into the future. Sometimes it’s hard to decipher if someone is lying to you or not, but quite often you can tell if they are by their body language.
Body Language Signs
The signs to look for are changes in their visible behavior, such as gestures and body stance, and verbal attributes, such as their tone of voice and speech pattern. Their tone of voice may become higher or lower-pitched.
If the person is someone you know well, observe how they behave most days, and how they communicate and respond to questions during a casual conversation. Once you know their regular behaviors it’s easier to spot the inconsistencies. Look for inconsistencies when you shift to threatening questions.
A huge sign is that a liar’s body language will be contradictory to what they are saying. Those who are telling the truth will have a confident stance and posture. They will speak with ease and appear comfortable.
Most liars fidget, with either their hands or feet. They show indifference by shrugging their shoulders, pretending to be bored or lacking expression, and their posture becomes curved to make themselves smaller and hopefully less noticeable.
Here are a few more signs you can watch out for:
Observe Their Eyes
If a liar needs to respond to surprise questions about their story, watch their eyes. The saying that our eyes are windows to our soul may be true because we can see varied emotions in them. It is possible to spot a liar by observing how their eyes react. Gaze aversion is a good example, such as when someone feels they can’t look you in the eye.
You may notice they cannot look you in the eye anymore and may even pace back and forth while responding with more lies. Sometimes, they will try and put a barrier between you and them so that you can’t meet eye to eye. They will also try to get you to focus on something or someone else so that they are not having to look into your eyes.
However, lying is not always linked with avoiding eye contact, it can also be where they blink more than normal. A shifting blink rate can indicate deception if the person starts batting their eyelids more quickly or slowly than they usually do. Even constriction or dilation of their pupils may be observed. So look into their eyes if you think a person is lying to you.
Watch the Muscles In Their Face
Some of the muscles in our face cannot be consciously controlled and are activated by our emotions, such as shock, anger, surprise, and grief. Therefore, if someone is telling you a lie, their face may betray them.
Examples are changes in facial color, from healthy to a pale shade of pink, slight flaring of nostrils, biting their lips, perspiring lightly, or rapid blinking of their eyes. Take advantage of these changes in expression and probe by questioning why they feel that way.
These expressions may be fleeting if they can quickly control their emotions, so be ready to watch, so that you can see if they are concealing the truth from you.
Watch Their Smile – Is It Sincere or False?
Honest people smile not only with their lips but also with their eyes. The expression on the upper portion of their face should match the lower portion, so observe the eyes of your suspected liar.
If they press their lips together and noticeably force a smile, and their eyes are not smiling, their expression doesn’t match, so there is a problem. They are probably faking their smile to hide their lies.
Are They Starting to Sweat?
When we get nervous what do we do? We sweat! Or at least some of us do. Perhaps your liar is one of those people. Pressing the liar for some clarifications regarding their lie can make their brain temperature rise. It can cause perspiration in their forehead or upper lip area. To calm it, they unconsciously manifest some body language, such as facial hand rubbing, hair twirling, swallowing, or exhibiting a faster breathing rate.
All people are different and therefore, there will be different body language signs to observe. However, if you can remember the above signs the next time you suspect someone is lying to you, you will be better equipped to handle the situation.
