Pants on fire: the electrophysiological signature of telling a lie

Anterior N2 enhancement is not a general electrophysiological index of concealed information

Event-related potentials (ERPs) have been used with the concealed information test (CIT) to detect concealed recognition of specific stimuli (i.e., "probes"). While most research has focused on the P300 component, which is larger for infrequent probes than for frequent control stimuli (i.e., "irrelevants"), some studies have investigated an earlier ERP component, the anterior N2, with mixed results. Although some studies have reported a larger anterior N2 for probes than irrelevants (N2 enhancement), other studies, including our own, have not found such an effect. The present study aimed to replicate and extend our previous findings using the same CIT paradigm and measurement parameters. Results of Bayesian analyses show strong evidence against the hypothesis of anterior N2 enhancement by probes, replicating our previous work. Bayesian analyses also show strong evidence against the hypothesis of N2 enhancement for the three components revealed by a temporal principal component analysis (PCA) conducted to disentangle potentially overlapping ERP effects. In conclusion, whereas the CIT has shown promise in detecting recognition of specific information, anterior N2 enhancement cannot be used as an electrophysiological measure of concealed information across CIT paradigms.

Does deception involve more cognitive control than truth-telling? Meta-analyses of N2 and MFN ERP studies

A number of psychological theories propose that deception involves more cognitive control than truth-telling. Over the last decades, event-related potentials (ERPs) have been used to unravel this question, but the findings are mixed. To address this controversy, two meta-analyses were conducted to quantify the results of existing studies reporting N2 or medial frontal negativity (MFN) associated with deception. In total, 32 papers consisting of 1091 participants were included, which yielded 32 effect sizes for N2 and 7 effect sizes for MFN. We found that deception was associated with a more negative N2 and MFN than truth-telling with medium and large effect sizes (r = .25 and .51, respectively). We also found that the deception paradigm modulated the results (p = .043), but found no evidence for publication bias. Our findings indicate that deception involves more cognitive control than truth-telling. Our review also identifies gaps in this literature, including a need for more ERP studies using spontaneous deception.

Concealing Untrustworthiness: The Role of Conflict Monitoring in a Social Deception Task

Deception studies emphasize the important role of event-related potentials (ERPs) to uncover deceptive behavior based on underlying neuro-cognitive processes. The role of conflict monitoring as indicated by the frontal N2 component during truthful and deceptive responses was investigated in an adapted Concealed Information Test (CIT). Previously memorized pictures of faces should either be indicated as truthfully trustworthy, truthfully untrustworthy or trustworthy while concealing the actual untrustworthiness (untrustworthy-probe). Mean, baseline-to-peak and peak-to-peak amplitudes were calculated to examine the robustness of ERP findings across varying quantification techniques. Data of 30 participants (15 female; age: M = 23.73 years, SD = 4.09) revealed longer response times and lower correct rates for deceptive compared to truthful trustworthy responses. The frontal N2 amplitude was more negative for untrustworthy-probe and truthful untrustworthy compared to truthful trustworthy stimuli when measured as mean or baseline-to-peak amplitude. Results suggest that deception evokes conflict monitoring and ERP quantifications are differentially sensitive to a-priori hypotheses.

Cognitive processes during deception about attitudes revisited: a replication study

Event-related potential (ERP) studies about deception often apply recognition tasks. It remains questionable whether reported ERP patterns and cognitive processes can be generalized to other contexts. As the study by Johnson et al. (2008) fills this gap by investigating deception regarding attitudes, we tried to replicate it. Participants (N = 99) were instructed to lie or tell the truth about their attitudes. We obtained the same results as Johnson et al. (2008): lies were accompanied by enhanced medial frontal negativities (MFN) and suppressed late positive components (LPCs) indicating that lying relied on stronger cognitive control processes and response conflicts than being honest. The amplitudes of pre-response positivities (PRP) were reduced for lies implying that lies about attitudes were accompanied by strategic monitoring. MFN amplitudes increased and LPC amplitudes decreased for lies about positively valued items revealing that lying about positively valued items is cognitively more challenging than lying about negatively valued items. As a new finding, MFN, LPC and PRP components were neither moderated by Machiavellianism nor by changes in the attitude ratings. The results indicate that LPC, MFN and PRP components are reliable indicators of the cognitive processes used during deception and that it is worthwhile to investigate them in further deception contexts.

Neurocognitive mechanisms underlying deceptive hazard evaluation: An event-related potentials investigation

Deceptive behavior is common in human social interactions. Researchers have been trying to uncover the cognitive process and neural basis underlying deception due to its theoretical and practical significance. We used Event-related potentials (ERPs) to investigate the neural correlates of deception when the participants completed a hazard judgment task. Pictures conveying or not conveying hazard information were presented to the participants who were then requested to discriminate the hazard content (safe or hazardous) and make a response corresponding to the cues (truthful or deceptive). Behavioral and electrophysiological data were recorded during the entire experiment. Results showed that deceptive responses, compared to truthful responses, were associated with longer reaction time (RT), lower accuracy, increased N2 and reduced late positive potential (LPP), suggesting a cognitively more demanding process to respond deceptively. The decrement in LPP correlated negatively with the increment in RT for deceptive relative to truthful responses, regardless of hazard content. In addition, hazardous information evoked larger N1 and P300 than safe information, reflecting an early processing bias and a later evaluative categorization process based on motivational significance, respectively. Finally, the interaction between honesty (truthful/deceptive) and safety (safe/hazardous) on accuracy and LPP indicated that deceptive responses towards safe information required more effort than deceptive responses towards hazardous information. Overall, these results demonstrate the neurocognitive substrates underlying deception about hazard information.