Trust is the glue that binds relationships. It is the elastic that allows us to separate as individuals and return to the group, no questions asked. It is the ticket to group membership and a key to intimacy. Trust is created as we experience our significant others representing themselves, in action and behavior, accurately and consistently. When this doesn’t happen, we begin to suspect that the other is not telling the truth about themselves—that they are lying. This creates a paradox in close relationships since closeness and lack of trust are at fundamental odds with one another. How do we deal with lying in a close relationship? And how do we promote truthtelling? To answer these questions, it helps first to understand the function of lying and the circumstances within which lying arises.
As individuals, we strike an often delicate balance between taking care of our own needs and being mindful of the needs of our close others. We have been programmed to be capable of hiding our true nature when we deem it necessary. Lying, misrepresenting, misleading, and disguising have been as integral to evolution as the truthtelling that engenders trust and creates a stable bond in society. Examples of other species which have evolved qualities or capabilities to help them survive through deceit include the large moths that have evolved eye-shaped decorations on their open wings so that they look like an owl to scare off their predators. The Venus Flytrap feeds itself by luring insects into its mouth with delicious, sweet-smelling sap. A more actively deceitful species of bird promotes species survival by luring predators away from its young in the nest by pretending to be injured.
The benefits of deceit are balanced by the fact that the social consequences for lying can be harsh and extreme. This is can be seen across the entire animal kingdom, even in the case of wasps. Elizabeth Tibbetts of the University of Arizona altered the status markings on the faces of female wasps and then studied their treatment as ‘liars’ by the wasps to which they misrepresented their status (whom they had ‘betrayed’). “Individuals caught in a lie during battle suffered endless harassment afterward… the group showed zero tolerance for social fakers.” (Discover, 2005)
As humans, our “gut response” when we perceive someone is lying to us can be just as extreme. We may try to force truth-telling through extraordinary means or excessive control. However, for humans this is an approach doomed to failure. We are just too capable of altering the way we ‘come across’ in order to maintain social closeness. Since the one who has lied has already shown an inclination to hide the truth as a means for promoting self-interest, trying to force or coerce the truth from the liar will very likely result in surface compliance, or telling the betrayed what they want to hear. A harsh reaction to lying often makes the situation worse and obscures an understanding of the lying behavior.
Whether witnessed in a child or a marital partner, lying can productively be thought of as reflecting the difficulty that individual is having at being and expressing honestly and openly who they are. Another way to think about dishonesty is that the individual who lies is one who perceives a lack of freedom—from constraints related to external consequences or internal emotions—to speak his or her own truth. This line of thinking is consistent with the ancient philosopher Aristotle’s view of lying as a failure of autonomy and self-respect. The Greeks placed a high value on character and virtue and held that an individual earns respect by incorporating values into daily living. Lying is thought to reflect a loss of control. This line of reasoning suggests a means for dealing with lying which promotes the strengthening of inner character rather than the commanding of external compliance—which actually reduces freedom.
The following brief overview of Aristotle’s thoughts about lying is drawn from a presentation by Jane Zembaty, Ph.D., of the University of Dayton, to the Center for the Study of Ethics in Society at Western Michigan University in 1992.
“Unfreedom or slavishness is attributed to those who lie out of
- Need, fear, or acquisitiveness or out of a desire for others’ approval. It involves a
- Lack of sufficient control over one’s internal states and/or one’s external situation.”
A child may lie to a parent, for example, to avoid disapproval. Alternatively, a spouse may lie to their partner to avoid the intense inner anxiety that would result from exposure. One who lies out of a lack of freedom is epitomized by Aristotle as a slave. “Disempowered and precluded from being self-determining, slaves are not permitted to either choose their own goals or to make the sorts of choices or voluntarily perform the sort of actions which are grounds for respect.”
Aristotle’s thoughts about lying have great psychological implications. Truthtelling is seen to be at the core of self-respect. Rather than viewing lying strictly from the point of view of its impact on others, truthtelling is framed as a manifestation of the individual’s ability to know herself and speak her truth. In order to do this, she must be able to withstand external disapproval for the sake of expressing self. We get into a bind in dealing with lying if we approach it from the point of view “you cannot lie because I told you not to lie”. If lying is a manifestation of low status or low autonomy, reducing the individual’s autonomy by tightening control increases, not decreases, the potential for lying. Lying is more likely to evolve in climates or systems within which individual freedom of expression is not allowed. When shame is attached to thinking or being different, it breeds dishonesty. When this happens, it is more shameful to be different than it is to lie.
While every situation in which lying occurs is unique, the basic guidelines which follow can be useful when thinking through difficult interpersonal situations:
- Resist the impulse to control and punish exclusively.
- Try to understand—through dialogue, though observation, etc—what is driving the behavior. For example, try to understand what the cost may be to the individual to tell the truth. If an individual does not feel free to tell the truth, explore the reasons.
- Portray the telling of truth as an act of freedom that at times requires courage in the face of consequences or disapproval.
- Encourage truthtelling through an expression of your own desire to know the truth, and your own commitment to listen with open ears and bear up under its’ expression (even if you don’t like it! Particularly with children and teens, the means of expression may be loud or strident. Remember that this is about being tolerant of expressions of feeling—however intense. Intense does not mean aggressive or abusive!)
- Ask for a commitment to honesty in the relationship.
Implementing these guidelines may take one down a rocky road, but the hard work can lead to the achievement of a deeper connection anchored by the structure of a stronger character.