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II. INFORMATION MANIPULATION THEORY. 5. Conversational Implicature. 5. Information Manipulation Theory. 9. III. INTERPERSONAL DECEPTION THEORY.
Typology: Lecture notes
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by Chad C. Edwards
A SENIOR THESIS in GENERAL STUDIES Submitted to the General Studies Council in the College of Arts and Sciences at Texas Tech University in Partial fulfillment of the Degree of BACHELOR OF GENERAL STUDIES Approved
i I (^) ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
In preparing this work, I have received help from numerous sources. Many of these have been noted on the reference page. I would like to thank Dr. Charlotte Dunham of the Sociology Department and Dr. David Williams of the Communication Studies Department for serving on my committee. I would also like to thank Dr. Jim Sahlman from Angelo State University for his help. Additionally, I would like to thank my wife and daughter—Autumn and America Edwards—for their support. Without the help of the people above, this project would have never been completed.
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Deceit and lying can be found in many aspects of our society. Falsehoods can have important consequences for both the deceiver and the one being deceived (Hocking, Bauchner, Kaminski, & Miller, 1979). The study of deception is probably as old as the study of communication itself. As early as 900 B.C. in literature and historical accounts, people were describing the "liar" (Hocking et al., 1979). In the late 1800's, researchers were trying to identify physiological differences (e.g. eye movements, etc.) between lying and truth-telling individuals (Hocking et al., 1979). Although, this type of research had obvious limitations (in not considering the verbal dimension) it did lead to more scientific types of research. This paper will examine one of the earlier modern scientific deception theories and then proceed to examine the two main present theories. Ekman and Friesen (1969) were two notable pioneers in the emergence of modern deception theories. They maintained that people will "leak" emotional (nonverbal) behaviors when being deceitful. They proposed that micromonentary behaviors (e.g., knitted brow) are behaviors that are leaked when deception occurs. They suggested that the leakage cues occur in a "leakage hierarchy"; however, there was dispute as to the order of the leaks: that is, whether shifty eyes, say, preceded twitching fingers. Ekman and Friesen (1969)
also suggested that it is difficult for the deception to occur when the deceiver thinks that negative consequences will occur. However, their main concept, "leakage," refers to the nonverbal behaviors which are shown by the deceiver that express his or her true emotion (Ekman & Friesen, 1969). Ekman & Friesen (1969) established the difference between "leakage accuracy" (being able to identify the true affect) and "deception accuracy" (recognizing whether deception is occurring)--a distinction which would help future researchers (Hurd & Noller, 1988). Furthermore, Ekman and Friesen (1969) argued that there are three types of nonverbal activities that can help one detect deception: origin, coding, and usage (Littlejohn, 1996).
Origin Origin refers to the source of an act (Littlejohn, 1996). For example, the deceiver is the origin. A nonverbal behavior can be innate (built into the nervous system), species-constant (universal behavior required for survival), or variant across groups and sub-groups (Littlejohn, 1996). By examining the type of origin framework, one can have a better understanding of whether deception is happening.
However, the friend sees this action and attributes meaning to it no matter what the communicative intent of his/her friend. Although Ekman and Freisen attracted attention to deceitful behavior as a communication phenomena, their research was limited in that it was only interested in the micro level behaviors that are exhibited during deception (Ekman & Freisen, 1969). This type of research ignored all other types of possible deceptive cues. Nevertheless, Ekman and Friesen (1969) provided the necessary framework for various deception theories that were to follow. Among their contributions, Ekman and Friesen (1969) demonstrated that deception could occur on two levels: strategic and nonstrategic. Strategic is purposeful manipulation of deceptive cues, and the nonstrategic level involves cues that are "leaked". Their concept of the usage dimension allows for both strategic and nonstrategic deception. Their usage element would later influence the work of Buller and Burgoon (1994;1996). Furthermore, Ekman and Friesen's three elements (origin, coding, and usage) were built on by the later work on deception by Grice (1989) and McCornack (1992), which will be explored in the next chapter.
After the work of Ekman and Friesen, other researchers studies deception and developed alternative theories. For instance. Information Manipulation Theory was first developed by Steven McCornack. His theory is an extension of the work of Paul Grice (who had built on the foundation of Ekman and Friesen). Grice (1989) proposes four conversational maxims that form the cooperative principle. Collectively, these maxims are labeled the Conversational Implicature. This chapter will first examine the Conversational Implicature as developed by Grice and then examine how Grice's work influenced Information Manipulation Theory.
Conversational Implicature Paul Grice devised a theory of language use that now has become known as the conversational implicature (McCornack, 1992). Grice (1989) maintained that people involved in any interaction follow a general principle of cooperation. The cooperative principle defines when and how a person is required to contribute to a conversation. In order for a mutually satisfying conversation to take place, the contributors must follow and adhere to the cooperative principle. The cooperative principle allows for each person to reach an agreement for the conversation.
Sahlman and Canary (1996) gave an example based on the Information Manipulation Theory (IMT) to demonstrate the cooperative principle and the four maxims. One day a son attends a basketball game instead of doing his homework. The son comes home late, which has become a repeated event. The father will probably ground the son for many weeks. IMT argues that the son's response will vary among the five response modes to the father's question: "Where have you been? You're late again and you had better have a good excuse!" The first option for the son is tell the truth and live up to the expectations of the cooperative principle. The other four modes of responses will vary or violate according to the four maxims (which will be applied to the example in the next section).
Cooperative Principle The cooperative principle is the idea that a person is to answer or disclose all relevant information to another person's inquiry (Sahlman & Canary, 1996) The son would tell the father all relevant information in order to be truthful. Deviant statements that covertly violate these expectations are not part of the cooperative principle. Quantity. Quantity refers to the amount of information given in any conversation. It is assumed that the information given will be as informative as required by the other's discourse (McCornack, 1992). However, if he chose to be deceptive, the son could be uncooperative and leave
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out critical information. "Hey, Dad, I'm sorry. I was at the school with the guys" (Sahlman & Canary, 1996). The son's response is truthful at some level; however, the son left out the critical information of being at the basketball game. The omission of information demonstrates a deceptive intent (McCornack, 1992). Ouality. Quality refers to the integrity of the information presented in any given conversation (Grice, 1989). Individuals are expected, according to the cooperative principle, not to make claims that are false or claims which lack evidence (McCornack, 1992). This maxim refers to the essence of what most people believe is deceptive communication (Sahlman & Canary, 1996). The son might respond "Hey, Dad, sorry I'm late. I was at the library working on school work" (Sahlman & Canary, 1996). This response reflects a complete fabrication that obviously violates the cooperative principle (McCornack, 1992). An absolute fabrication (e.g., boldface lie) would be the extreme end of the quality maxim. Manner. Manner refers to clarity and directness of the information (McCornack, 1992). The maxim manner includes the expectation that individuals will avoid vague and obscure statements and deliver the information in a direct and clear way (McCornack, 1992). The son could be noncooperative by responding, "I know I'm late. Dad. Things are very busy right now. I was doing a whole bunch of stuff and lost track of time. All of a sudden I was 8
been done on verbal deception (deTurk & Miller, 1985; Sahlman & Canary, 1996; Burgoon, Buller, Guerrero, Afif & Feldman, 1996). We do know that the verbal content of a deception is considered less consistent (Kraut, 1978). Furthermore, denials and falsification are used by deceivers (Metts, 1989). Verbal messages make up what is thought of as deceptive (Sahlman & Canary, 1996). Verbal statement are more reliable cues of deception than nonverbal behaviors (Miller & Stiff, 1993). Deceived people are deceived because of the verbal statements rather than the nonverbal behaviors. Until McCornack (1992), deception research had been deficient. Research relied on the recall method to examine deception. Through its use of narratives, IMT clearly shows it is possible to test deceptive messages without using the recall method, and without violating ethics in the process (McCornack Levine, Solowczuk, Torres, & Campbell, 1992 ). McCornack (1992) provides justification for applying the cooperative principle to deception communication:
Deceptive messages are unique from other forms of discourse in that they involve deviations from what can be considered rational and cooperative conversational behavior. When presented within ongoing conversations, deceptive messages mislead listeners through covertly violating the principles that underlie and guide conversational understanding, (p. 2, emphasis added)
Typings of Deception Current researchers have been using "typing" to evaluate deception (McCornack, 1992). However, typing limits the generalizations and validity of the taxonomies often because the researcher may be tempted to create the types to fit the research (McCornack, 1992). Therefore, a fundamental idea of IMT is that the coding of deceptive messages as a type (e.g. fabrications, half-truths, etc.) is limiting to research. Types present a finite number of the kinds of deceptions that can occur. If a new type is discovered a new category must be made. Eventually there could be thousands of types. IMT does not allow for types and maintains that the maxims can blend to allow for new discoveries. The four maxims allow one to mix and cross maxims much as one blends the primary colors to create secondary colors. Types force an idea into one category, regardless of the validity of the placement. For example, various researchers might type messages fundamentally different as identical. For example, a boldface lie and a half-truth could be put in the same category (McCornack, 1992).
Attributions Additionally, IMT provides for both the sender and the receiver perspectives. IMT exists as a receiver-based model of deception, ignoring whether or not deception was successful(Sahlman & Canary, 1996). For example, suppose a 11
However, Jacobs, Dawson & Brashers (1996) argue that deception does not necessarily occur only with the maxims, but instead deception may also be generated through false implicatures. For Jacobs et al. (1996), quality exists as the main maxim and all other maxims fall into the subsets (i.e. quantity, relation, and manner) of quality. For example, the son's violation of relation is really a quality violation with the subset of relation. According to Jacobs et al. (1996), implicatures can be created even when no maxim is violated. Rule conforming implicatures are generated on the assumption that what was said directly and literally conforms to the maxims (Jacobs et al., 1996). McCornack, Levine, Morrison, and Lapinski (1996) respond to this criticism of the theory by arguing that quantity, relation, or manner must generate erroneous quality violations. Quantity, relation, and manner give the impression of "coming clean" while actually being deceptive, hence the generation of erroneous quality maxims.
Covert versus Overt Sahlman & Canary (1996) made a positive contribution by pointing out that Information Manipulation Theory requires that the-violation be covert to the deceiver. McCornack (1992) states: "Deceptive messages are "deceptive' in that, while they constitute deviations from the principles underlying conversational understanding, they remain covert deviations" (p. 6, emphasis in original). The person who is 13
being deceived cannot know that the information is being manipulated. "From the perceiver's perspective, covert violations of these maxims are probably attributed when perceivers become suspicious" (Sahlman & Canary, 1996, p. 5). Overt violations do not make up deceptive communication (e.g., sarcasm) (McCornack, 1992). For example, in an interchange between two friends that are making sarcastic statements to one another during playful conversations, one might say, "Oh THAT was real smart!" This example would not be considered deceptive because the violation of the quality maxim was overtly made.
Information Manipulation Theory made advances in the deception field of research. It stresses the verbal dimension of deception, which no other previous research had looked at. IMT is a major improvement over other attempts to help explain deception.
Uncertainty and Vagueness Uncertainty and vagueness cues refer to the clarity of the statements. For example, an ambiguous statement would leave the feeling of uncertainty and vagueness. It is not entirely clear why one would strategically be uncertain in order to be deceptive (Koper & Sahlman, 1996). However, uncertainty could provide the deceiver with a potential explanation (e.g., misunderstanding) when probed about the lie (Koper & Sahlman, 1996). On the other hand, vagueness has been well documented in the research (Koper & Sahlman, 1996; Burgoon et al., 1996; Buller & Burgoon, 1994). Information management (or manipulation) is an easy way to create uncertainty or vagueness for the receiver. Information management is the manipulation of deceptive messages to disassociate the deceiver from the message, portray uncertainty or vagueness, or withhold information from the receiver (Buller et al., 1994). For example, one would see a sender who is vague in the discourse, or one who withholds critical information from the receiver. Furthermore, one could distance her/himself from the message entirely, hence completely disassociating from the message (e.g., using the statement "people say"). IDT proposes five dimensions along which deceivers manipulate information: veridicality, completeness, directness, clarity, and personalization.
Veridicality. Veridicality refers to the "truthfulness, honesty, veracity, or message fidelity"
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(Burgoon et al., 1996, p. 53). This dimension involves the very essence of what most people think of as deceptive communication. Grice's (1989) maxim of quality is the basis for this dimension veridicality. A deceiver who is successful in the deception must give the appearance of truth (Burgoon, et al., 1996). However, it is important to clarify the difference between actual veridicality and apparent veridicality. Actual veridicality examines the objective truth value of the message, while apparent veridicality refers to the believability of the verbal discourse in relation to the social context (Burgoon et al., 1996). Information Manipulation Theory does not recognize the difference between apparent truth and actual truth (Burgoon et al., 1996). For example, using the scenario from IMT, one would find the son's response the same; however, with the IDT theory ,one would examine the response on two levels: apparent truth and actual truth. Completeness. Completeness refers to the idea that a speaker provide as much information as required by the conversation (Burgoon et al., 1996). Completeness is basically the same as the quantity maxim of Grice (1989). Yet, Burgoon et al. (1996) argue that there are two types of completeness: informational completeness and conversational completeness. Informational completeness refers to the delivery of all important and relevant information. Informational completeness can only be determined by the reality of the
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