With all the lies that have been told since the dawn of man, one might think the art of lie detecting would be a fairly polished one by this time. But the fact is, we still conduct long court cases to root out mistruths, or we turn to machines, which are quicker but not always reliable.
But in our personal interactions we’re still largely lost.
Now British researcher Richard Wiseman, a magician turned psychologist, reveals that’s likely because we often rely on what our eyes tell us when we’re talking to someone, when it’s really our ears that are better at sensing untruths.
Wiseman set about to determine how good people were at lie detection and found that we get it right about half the time, which is not very good.
Then Wiseman set up a test to determine what medium offered the best shot at detecting lying. He arranged for a political broadcaster to film two clips, one where he talked about his favorite movie and one where he lied about which movie was his favorite.
The clips were shown on TV, aired on the radio, and the text was printed in a newspaper. Tens of thousands of people phoned in to say which they thought was the truthful clip and which they thought was the lie.
Only 52 percent of those watching on TV got the right answer. Newspaper readers came in much higher, at 64 percent. But it was the radio listeners who excelled; 73 percent could pick the honest clip from the dishonest clip.
“When it comes to detecting lies, people are better off listening rather than looking,” concludes Wiseman, who says that linguistic patterns, not body language, provide the clues. A lie, for instance, tends to be shorter, and liars tend to try to distance themselves from the lie by not using the word “I” as often as they do when telling the truth.
Wiseman’s study is in his new book, “Quirkology: How We Discover the Big Truths in Small Things.” The book was first released in the UK and is now being released in the U.S.
It’s all pretty offbeat stuff, which is why he calls his area of research quirkology. He uses scientific methods to explore topics that mainstream scientists normally overlook but which illuminate basic aspects of human nature.
Wiseman is head of research at Britain’s University of Hertfordshire and Britain’s only professor for the public understanding of psychology.
For over 20 years he has been studying such diverse topics as deception, luck, humor and the paranormal. He’s traveled the world, dressing up in chicken costumes, counting how fast people walk and spending the night in haunted houses.
In “Quirkology”, we learn such interesting things as that most people would sooner wear a sweater that has been dropped in a dog poo than a clean one formerly owned by a mass murderer. We also learn that there’s actually a mathematical formula for a successful personal ad. Handy stuff.
Far more important, perhaps, we learn something about jokes.
As part of his research, Wiseman set out to identify the world’s funniest joke. He urged people around the world to send in their favorite joke to a web site and also to vote on the jokes there.
Some 40,000 jokes, excluding the rude ones, were sent in and some 350,000 people from around the world voted.
Wiseman saw long-accepted patterns appear.
Top jokes tended to be those that make the person hearing it feel superior. This is why we like jokes that make the people in them look foolish. People also tend to laugh at the aspects of life that cause them the greatest anxiety.
However, humor is too complex to really unravel, believes Wiseman.
“Working as a magician you realize the subtlety. The smallest pause or intonation can make or break it. Humor is like magic: it only needs to be slightly out of focus and the whole thing will fall down,” he says. “Psychologists are still in the dark ages in understanding it.”
All that aside, what's the world's funniest joke?
Here it is: “Two hunters are out in the woods when one of them collapses. He doesn’t seem to be breathing and his eyes are glazed. The other guy whips out his phone and calls the emergency services. He gasps, ‘My friend is dead! What can I do?’ The operator says, ‘Calm down. I can help. First, let’s make sure he’s dead.’ There is silence, then a shot is heard. Back on the phone, the guy says ‘OK, now what?’”
And among the worst jokes the world over: Why did the chicken cross the road? To get to the other side.
Meanwhile, elsewhere in popcult, Fox’s “The Simpsons Movie” fell out of the top spot at the box office this weekend, making way for “The Bourne Ultimatum,” which pulled in $70.2 million in its first weekend in release.
In DVD rentals for the week ended July 29, according to IMDb.com, new releases “The Number 23” and “Zodiac” topped the chart, with last week’s No. 1, “Premonition,” falling to No. 3.
On iTunes for the week ended yesterday, Sean Kingston’s “Beautiful Girls” remained No. 1 for the second straight week, with Kanye West’s “Stronger” coming in at No. 2.
In books, Harry Potter’s hot streak continues. J.K. Rowling’s series of books again this week accounted for six of the top 10 spots on USA Today’s book chart for the week ended July 29, including five of the top six, with “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” at No. 1.
|
TOP MOVIES
Weekend Box Office Estimates
Weekend of August 3-5, 2007
|
|
Rank
|
MOVIE
|
Engagements
|
Box office (millions)
|
|
1
|
The Bourne Ultimatum (Universal)
|
3,660
|
$70.18
|
|
2
|
The Simpsons Movie (Fox)
|
3,926
|
$25.60
|
|
3
|
Underdog (
Buena Vista)
|
3,013
|
$12.01
|
|
4
|
I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry (Universal)
|
3,289
|
$10.53
|
|
5
|
Hairspray (New Line)
|
3,115
|
$9.33
|
|
6
|
Harry Potter and the Order of the
Phoenix (Warner Bros.)
|
3,125
|
$9.29
|
|
7
|
No Reservations (Warner Bros.)
|
2,425
|
$6.57
|
|
8
|
Transformers (
Paramount)
|
2,419
|
$5.95
|
|
9
|
Hot Rod (
Paramount)
|
2,607
|
$5.02
|
|
10
|
Bratz (Lionsgate)
|
1,509
|
$4.31
|
|
Source: Yahoo Movies
|
|
IMDb TOP DVD RENTALS
Week ending July 29, 2007
|
|
Rank
|
TITLE
|
Last week
|
|
1
|
The Number 23
|
-
|
|
2
|
Zodiac
|
-
|
|
3
|
Premonition
|
1
|
|
4
|
The Hills Have Eyes 2
|
2
|
|
5
|
The Contract
|
-
|
|
6
|
Shooter
|
3
|
|
7
|
Slow Burn
|
-
|
|
8
|
Black Snake Moan
|
4
|
|
9
|
Perfume: The Story of a Murderer
|
-
|
|
10
|
The Last Mimzy
|
5
|
|
Source: IMDB
|
|
ITUNES TOP 10 SONG DOWNLOADS
for week ended Sunday, August 5, 2007
|
|
Rank
|
TITLE
|
|
1
|
Beautiful Girls, Sean Kingston
|
|
2
|
Stronger, Kanye West
|
|
3
|
The Way I Are, Timbaland
|
|
4
|
Big Girls Don’t Cry, Fergie
|
|
5
|
Sorry, Blame it on Me, Akon
|
|
6
|
Umbrella, Rihanna
|
|
7
|
Shut up and Drive, Rihanna
|
|
8
|
Potential Breakup Song, Aly & AJ
|
|
9
|
A
Bay
Bay, Hurricane Chris
|
|
10
|
Hey There Delilah, Plain White T’s
|
|
Source: iTunes
|
|
NEW YORK
TIMES BESTSELLING BOOKS
Week ending July 28, 2007
|
|
Fiction (hardback)
|
|
Rank
|
TITLE
|
Last week
|
Weeks on chart
|
|
1
|
A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini
|
1
|
10
|
|
2
|
The Secret Servant
by Daniel Silva
|
-
|
1
|
|
3
|
The Quickie by James Patterson and Michael Ledwidge
|
2
|
4
|
|
4
|
High Noon by Nora Roberts
|
3
|
3
|
|
5
|
The Tin Roof Blowdown by James Lee Burke
|
4
|
2
|
|
Nonfiction (hardback)
|
|
1
|
Lone Survivor
by Marcus Luttrell with Patrick Robinson
|
2
|
7
|
|
2
|
Quiet Strength
by Tony Dungy with Nathan Whitaker
|
1
|
3
|
|
3
|
God Is Not Great by Christopher Hitchens
|
3
|
13
|
|
4
|
A Long Way Gone
by Ishmael Beah
|
5
|
24
|
|
5
|
Legacy of Ashes by
Tim Weiner
|
9
|
3
|
|
Fiction (paperback)
|
|
1
|
Water for Elephants
by Sara Gruen
|
1
|
15
|
|
2
|
Ricochet
by Sandra Brown
|
-
|
1
|
|
3
|
The Kite Runner
by Khaled Hosseini
|
2
|
125
|
|
4
|
Dockside
by Susan Wiggs
|
-
|
1
|
|
5
|
Echo
Park
by Michael Connelly
|
-
|
1
|
|
Nonfiction (paperback)
|
|
1
|
Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert
|
1
|
27
|
|
2
|
The
Glass
Castle by Jeannette Walls
|
2
|
81
|
|
3
|
90 Minutes in Heaven
by Don Piper with Cecil Murphey
|
4
|
10
|
|
4
|
Blink by Malcolm Gladwell
|
3
|
17
|
|
5
|
The World is Flat by Thomas L. Friedman.
|
-
|
1
|
|
Source: New York Times
|
|
USA
TODAY BESTSELLING BOOKS
Week ending July 29, 2007
|
|
Rank
|
TITLE
|
Last week
|
|
1
|
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling
|
1
|
|
2
|
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by J.K. Rowling
|
2
|
|
3
|
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J.K. Rowling
|
4
|
|
4
|
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling
|
9
|
|
5
|
Ricochet
by Sandra Brown
|
-
|
|
6
|
Harry Potter and the Order of the
Phoenix by J.K. Rowling
|
6
|
|
7
|
The Secret by Rhonda Byrne
|
8
|
|
8
|
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling
|
13
|
|
9
|
A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini
|
7
|
|
10
|
Dakota Trilogy #01: Dakota Born by Debbie Macomber
|
-
|
|
Source:
USA Today
|
