I study liars. I've never seen one like Donald Trump.
'I spent the first two decades of my career as a social scientist studying liars and their lies. I thought I had developed a sense of what to expect from them. Then along came President Donald Trump. His lies are both more frequent and more malicious than ordinary people's.
In research beginning in the mid-1990s, when I was a professor at the University of Virginia, my colleagues and I asked 77 college students and 70 people from the nearby community to keep diaries of all the lies they told every day for a week. They handed them in to us with no names attached. We calculated participants' rates of lying and categorized each lie as either self-serving (told to advantage the liar or protect the liar from embarrassment, blame or other undesired outcomes) or kind (told to advantage, flatter or protect someone else).
At The Washington Post, the Fact Checker feature has been tracking every false and misleading claim and flip-flop made by Trump this year. The inclusion of misleading statements and flip-flops is consistent with the definition of lying my colleagues and I gave to our participants: "A lie occurs any time you intentionally try to mislead someone." In the case of Trump's claims, though, it is possible to ascertain only whether they were false or misleading, and not what the president's intentions were.
I categorized the most recent 400 lies that The Post had documented through mid-November in the same way my colleagues and I had categorized the lies of the participants in our study. . .
In Trump's first 298 days in office, however, he made 1,628 false or misleading claims or flip-flops, by The Post's tally. That's about six per day, far higher than the average rate in our studies. And of course, reporters have access to only a subset of Trump's false statements the ones he makes publicly so unless he never stretches the truth in private, his actual rate of lying is almost certainly higher.'>>>
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/commentary/ct-donald-trump-liar-20171208-story,amp.html
sandensea
(21,635 posts)If he had written (or rather, ghost-written) that book truthfully, the above essay by Bella DePaulo is what it would sound like.
Thank you for this, Ellen. Great reading.
elleng
(130,917 posts)Watching Pink Panther now.
sandensea
(21,635 posts)But luckily for us, Bob Mueller's no Clouseau.
elleng
(130,917 posts)Have a great rest of the weekend!
elleng
(130,917 posts)It was a line in the movie, and just HAD to recite it!
sandensea
(21,635 posts)elleng
(130,917 posts)sandensea
(21,635 posts)Now I'm acting like our friend Clouseau. It's late.
Rhiannon12866
(205,405 posts)This nails the exact reason that Trump - as a human being, let alone in a position of power - is so horrifically disturbing...
BigmanPigman
(51,593 posts)are politicians and break that down into part affiliation and the years that they served.
Most people are willing to give the benefit of the doubt because we do need a reason not to believe (as stated in the article) but there are factors - our beliefs, values, principles, past experiences - and our biases, of course - that can and do put a check on giving that benefit.
I'm less inclined to believe a republican/conservative politician about anything, for instance. Partly because of past experiences with republicans/conservatives - their actions v. words and their actions on their own merit - which over time has created a bias against believing them. A republican might be lying 99% of the time but because of that bias, I miss that 1%, kind of thing. Negligible, maybe - but the bias still exist. In being honest with myself, I have to acknowledge that bias. In doing so, I fully expect a republican to take what I just said out of context and claim what I said means I discriminate against them.
But that could be my bias talking. (Snort)
Sorry.
K&R
I studied lying over a period of time a long time ago, so much so I began to test those around me, those close to me. Situations and relationships didn't turn ugly so much as I turned ugly. I didn't like the me I was becoming. I did take away some useful skills though.
elleng
(130,917 posts)just 'depression.' The liar was my husband.
Solly Mack
(90,767 posts)tavalon
(27,985 posts)I'm not discounting his narcissistic personality disorder or his psychopathy, but Alzheimer's patients, in the early stages, lie their asses off in an attempt to seem mentally with it.
elleng
(130,917 posts)Bella DePaulo is the author of "How We Live Now: Redefining Home and Family in the 21st Century" and "Singled Out: How Singles Are Stereotyped, Stigmatized, and Ignored, and Still Live Happily Ever After."
I do NOT think its rational for us to chalk his antisocial behavior to alzheimers. He is responsible.
tavalon
(27,985 posts)His lying is getting worse than it was even a year ago. He can't even seem to remember things he said a year ago.
Hayduke Bomgarte
(1,965 posts)Just... Wow.
Cary
(11,746 posts)The facet that amazed me was how easy it was to brainwash people.
I would like to see #fakepresident compared to other cults and cult leaders. That would be apples to apples.