From Little Lies To Filthy Liars - The Evolution of Honesty and Deception in Young Children

FROM LITTLE WHITE LIES TO FILTHY LIARS:
THE EVOLUTION OF HONESTY AND DECEPTION

IN YOUNG CHILDREN
Victoria Talwar* and Angela Crossman{

* DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATIONAL & COUNSELLING PSYCHOLOGY,
MCGILL UNIVERSITY, MONTREAL, QUEBEC, CANADA
{
JOHN JAY COLLEGE OF CRIMINAL JUSTICE, CITY UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK,
NEW YORK, USA
I. THE PARADOX OF LIES
II. NORMATIVE LIE-TELLING

A. THE DEVELOPING CONCEPT OF LIES
B. THE DEVELOPMENT OF LIE-TELLING BEHAVIOR
C. COGNITIVE AND SOCIAL FACTORS INFLUENCING THE
DEVELOPMENT OF LYING
III. DEVELOPING A CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK OF LYING
IV. LYING AS A PROBLEM BEHAVIOR
V. FROM NORMATIVE TO PROBLEM BEHAVIORAND BACK AGAIN?

A. SUMMARY
VI. THE ROAD MAP: FUTURE DIRECTIONS
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
REFERENCES
Abstract
Though it is frequently condemned, lie-telling is a common and frequent

activity in interpersonal interactions, with apparent social risks and benets.
The current review examines the development of deception among children.
It is argued that early lying is normative, reecting childrens emerging cog-
nitive and social development. Children lie to preserve self-interests as well
as for the benet of others. With age, children learn about the social norms
that promote honesty while encouraging occasional prosocial lie-telling.
Yet, lying can become a problem behavior with frequent or inappropriate
use over time. Chronic lie-telling of any sort risks social consequences, such
139
Advances in Child Development and Behavior Copyright 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Janette B. Benson : Editor
140 Victoria Talwar and Angela Crossman
as the loss of credibility and damage to relationships. By middle childhood,

chronic reliance on lying may be related to poor development of conscience,
weak self-regulatory control, and antisocial behavior, and it could be indica-
tive of maladjustment and put the individual in conict with the environ-
ment. The goal of the current chapter is to capture the complexity of lying
and build a preliminary understanding of how childrens social experiences
with their environments, their own dispositions, and their developing cogni-
tive maturity interact, over time, to predict their lying behavior and, for
some, their chronic and problem lying. Implications for fostering honesty
in young children are discussed.
Any fool can tell the truth, but it requires a man of some sense to know how to lie
well.
Samuel Butler, Notebooks of Samuel Butler (1912)
I. The Paradox of Lies
Scientists and laypersons alike have been fascinated with lying in chil-
dren since the emergence of developmental psychology (Darwin, 1877;
Hall, 1891; Hartshorne & May, 1928; Stern & Stern, 1909). The scientic
study of the development of lying began at the turn of the twentieth cen-
tury, when developmental psychology as a eld of scientic research was
just being established. The topic then lay dormant for nearly half a cen-
tury, perhaps because the zeitgeist shifted away from social inuences
and mental activity toward behaviorist principles, making psychology
unreceptive to deception in intentional and mentalistic terms. As cognitive
and social principles and explanations regained acceptance, lying became
more interesting to those studying the development of intentional systems
in children. Recently, researchers with diverse theoretical orientations and
research purposes have shown a renewed interest in the development of
lying. This fascination stems from the perception that childrens seemingly
innocent and poorly crafted lies are kaleidoscopes through which one can
clarify relations among aspects of development, such as moral and cogni-
tive development (Piaget, 1932/1965; Talwar & Lee, 2008), understanding
of others minds (Peskin, 1992), personal character and integrity (Har-
tshorne & May, 1928), delinquent tendencies (Stouthamer-Loeber,
1986), and credibility as witnesses in legal cases (Bussey, Lee, &
Grimbeek, 1993; Lyon, 2000).
In theory, lying is a reprehensible and inappropriate behavior (Bok,
1978). Folklore and religion are rife with stories of those who lie and
are punished for their evil ways, such as Aesops Peter, who falsely cried
Deception in Children 141
wolf and was later punished by losing credibility. World religions include
proscriptions against lying as major tenets of their faiths. Socially, lying
is discouraged and can have negative ramications for relationships and,
arguably, can signicantly damage the foundations of our moral charac-
ter, particularly our capacity for moral growth (Mertz Hsieh, 2004,
p. 171). Thus, lying is bad and immoral and nobody likes a liar.
However, despite the costs and potential harm to others, lying often
succeeds. History tells of liars like Hitler, who gave his word that peace
would be preserved while planning war. Literature and history tell of
the Trojans horse that secured victory, and Jacob deceiving his father to
steal his brother Esaus birthright. And how many politicians have not
(yet) been caught in their own deceptions? Hence, lying persists.
In addition, there are many situations in which lying is encouraged by
social agents, explicitly or implicitly. Some even argue for the inescapable
necessity of lying (Nyberg, 1993), in part because many lies are told for
the benet of others. For example, individuals often refrain from sharing
hurtful information with others to protect their feelings, such as telling a
gravely ill patient that treatment has not ravaged their appearance. Lies
may be told as a form of politeness, such as telling friends that the bad-
tasting meal they cooked is delicious. This type of white lie is common
in everyday social interactions and is considered by many to be socially
acceptable (DePaulo & Jordan, 1982). Some lies are even altruistic, as
with the deception by individuals who hid Jews during Nazi Occupation.
This is the paradox of lying. It is both desirable and reprehensible,
reecting both the best and the worst of human nature. Lies can be told
to harm or deprive others while helping oneself, and lies can also be told
for the sake of love, loyalty, and compassion. We condemn them and yet
frequently use them for both selsh and unselsh reasons. In fact,
adults tell low-stakes lies (i.e., lies without serious consequences) daily
in the course of their interactions (DePaulo, Kashy, Kirkendol, Wyer, &
Epstein, 1996).
The goal of the current chapter is to capture the complexity of lying;
that is, that lying can be both an early, normative behavior and an even-
tual problem behavior. In moderation and under the right circumstances,
deception is adaptive, but used excessively or indiscriminately, it is
condemned. Children must learn the difference in order to lie in a socially
appropriate and effective mannera process that is not well understood.
Here, we examine the early development of the understanding and prac-
tice of deception, a conceptual framework for understanding the develop-
ment of deception, as well as the cognitive, social, and other factors that
inuence childrens honesty and deception. Arguably, it is necessary to
understand these correlates of childrens normative lie-telling to explain
how lying develops as a problem behavior in some individuals and to

understand how to foster honesty in general.
Although research on the development of lying in children dates back
to the nineteenth century (Darwin, 1877; Stern & Stern, 1909), signicant
knowledge regarding this issue has been gained only in the past two
decades with the employment of new experimental methodologies that
create situations prompting children to lie spontaneously (e.g., Lewis, Sta-
nger, & Sullivan, 1989; Polak & Harris, 1999; Talwar & Lee, 2002a, 2002b,
2008). This research has led to a clearer understanding of the develop-
ment of lie-telling as a normative behavior. Most of this research has
examined basic questions about when lie-telling emerges, what types of
lies children tell, and their relation to cognitive abilities, particularly
childrens meta-representational abilities. However, there is a gap
between our understanding of how lying can emerge as part of childrens
normal development and how it can develop into a problem behavior for
some children. To bridge this gap, further investigation is needed into the
role of additional cognitive factors, such as executive functioning, and the
role of social and environmental factors that promote or discourage hon-
est behavior. Further, because lying tends to be perceived as a problem
behavior, it is important to differentiate between types of lies to better
understand when and for whom lying is (or is not) problematic, to study
the parameters under which children choose to lie (or not), and their rel-
ative prociency when they do choose to lie. When disseminated, this
knowledge will help parents and practitioners to understand and foster
childrens honesty.
II. Normative Lie-Telling
Lying has a dual nature in that it is a normative aspect of development

(and social interaction) and it can be perceived as a problem behavior.
Lying is normative both in the sense that it is a typical aspect of normal
child development, a ubiquitous human behavior that seems to appear
at similar ages in children across cultures (e.g., Talwar & Lee, 2002a, in
press; Xu & Lee, 2007) and in the sense that it is often socially accepted,
or the norm. This is not to argue that it is a desirable behavior, but rather
that the emergence of lying as a behavior is a milestone of childrens nor-
mal development.
Telling lies, however, is not the whole story. To be effective, childrens
intentional, verbal lies require a degree of cognitive and social sophistica-
tion. Indeed, effective lie-telling is a hallmark of childrens cognitive matu-
rity, including the emergence of executive functions such as inhibitory
control and meta-representational abilities, and their growing social

understanding, reecting social skill development and their interpretation
of social norms. As such lie-telling may be considered a very human
behavior; yet, broadly construed, deception in general is a common phe-
nomenon in nature.
Animals from insects to primates use various means such as camouage
and mimicry to gain a survival advantage over predators, prey, and even
conspecics (Searcy & Nowicki, 2005). However, camouage and mimicry
rely on physical deceptions and do not require any cognitive sophistication
or intentional misinformation. Lying, on the other hand, is an act of
deception where there is a verbal statement made with the intention of
creating a false belief in another. Lying is fundamentally tied to language.
While other physical acts of deception might also be intentional, such as
pointing an individual in the opposite direction from ones store of food,
it is difcult to determine whether deception seen in animals is intentional
in nature. Lacking the verbal statement, we would argue that animals act
to deceive, rather than lie. Nonetheless, notable cases of tactical deception
have been observed in nonhuman primates, and it has been suggested that
such cases are intentional in nature (Jolly, 1996; Whiten & Byrne, 1988).
Thus, Byrne and Whiten (1988, 1992) suggest that Machiavellian intelli-
gence is an evolutionary response to a need to deal with the sort of com-
plexity that social circumstances create. In this sense, the emergence of
lying can be seen as an adaptive strategy to help the individual interact
more effectively in his or her environment, particularly the social environ-
ment. It can help individuals acquire goals, cope with the demands of the
environment, and protect them from potential harm.
Seemingly intentional instances of deception seem to occur mainly
among primates. For instance, naturalistic observation of nonhuman
primates shows that they engage in tactical deception, particularly the
young and the weak (Byrne & Whiten, 1988), a nding mirrored among
human children (Newton, Reddy, & Bull, 2000). It is unclear what the
impetus is for this early display of tactical deception. However, for nonhu-
man primates, it has been suggested that in their competitive and hierar-
chical social environment, deception is a strategy for self-preservation, to
avoid the punitive actions of others higher in the social hierarchy (Jolly,
1996). Similarly, childrens dishonesty may be the outcome of their desire
to avoid punishment and to appear obedient (DePaulo & Jordan, 1982),
possibly an early social strategy to protect themselves from negative envi-
ronmental consequences. However, because it is a complex behavior, suc-
cessful deception requires signicant cognitive and social abilities (Byrne
& Whiten, 1992; de Waal, 1992). In particular, the human developmental
literature includes evidence of positive associations between childrens
ability to lie and their cognitive development (e.g., Polak & Harris, 1999;
Talwar, Gordon, & Lee, 2007). Therefore, the development of deception
may be viewed as a cognitive milestone in any species. The normative
development of lying among human children is reviewed below, both in
terms of childrens thoughts and in terms of their actions.
A. THE DEVELOPING CONCEPT OF LIES
Early research on childrens lying examined their conceptual and moral

understanding of lies (e.g., Piaget, 1932/1965). Childrens understanding of
what it means to lie develops over time, seemingly from a concrete to an
abstract construct. Early research indicated that children did not differen-
tiate among types of inaccurate statements (e.g., lies vs. guesses), making
factuality rather than intentionality critical and that they primarily distin-
guished a lie from the truth based on the degree to which the lie-teller
would be punished (Piaget, 1932/1965). Strichartz and Burton (1990) also
found that children as young as 3 years dened a statement as a lie solely
based on factualityincorrect statements made in good faith were called
lies. It was not until ages 610 years that children tended to consider the
speakers beliefs when characterizing the honesty of their statements
(Strichartz & Burton, 1990). Bussey (1992) also found that 8- and 11-
year-olds were more accurate at identifying lies than 5-year-olds. In addi-
tion, younger children were more likely to evaluate lies more negatively if
punishment was involved, compared to the older children.
However, Peterson, Peterson, and Seetos (1983) results contradict
Piagets ndings. Peterson and colleagues found that 5-year-olds did not
judge a punished lie any worse than an identical, self-protective lie that
was not punished. They also found the transition in lie-telling to be more
gradual than Piaget had originally thought, as 75% of 9-year-olds and
28% of 11-year-olds cited punishment as their only motivation for not
telling lies and that lies were wrong regardless of the possible con-
sequences (Peterson et al., 1983).
Research on childrens perceptions of white lies or prosocial lies (e.g.,
lies to be polite, to protect anothers feelings) further demonstrates the
evolution of childrens understanding of lies. For instance, Broomeld,
Robinson, and Robinson (2002) reported that children as young as age 4
demonstrate a nuanced understanding, believing that white lies can pro-
tect other peoples feelings and are sometimes appropriate. Moreover,
even very young children perceive white lies less negatively than lies for
ones own benet (Bussey, 1999), and by age 7, children will evaluate lies
based on their effects on others (Heyman, Sweet, & Lee, 2009). Together,
these ndings suggest that childrens understanding of lies evolves

throughout the preschool and elementary years. Lie denitions might ini-
tially be simply rule based (i.e., statements that are incorrect), but the
complexity of the concept grows during early childhood to include the
speakers intentions and the impact and social acceptability of the lies.
B. THE DEVELOPMENT OF LIE-TELLING BEHAVIOR
In recent years, there also has been increased interest in examining

childrens actual lie-telling behavior. Anecdotal evidence and observa-
tional studies suggest that children begin telling lies in the preschool years,
with some children beginning late in their second year (Newton et al.,
2000; Wilson, Smith, & Ross, 2003). DePaulo and Jordan (1982) suggest
that the earliest lies children tell are to escape imminent punishment.
Observational evidence suggests these early lies tend to be unsophisti-
cated, often readily detected with some probing, and are generally self-
protective in nature, not intended to harm others. Other early lies that
children tell are lies to obtain a reward, and these may be motivated rst
by a desire for material benets (i.e., a cookie from a forbidden cookie
jar) and later by a desire for social rewards (e.g., self-presentation lies).
The most frequent lies that children tell tend to be lies to conceal
misdeeds (Newton et al., 2000; Stouthamer-Loeber, 1986; Wilson et al.,
2003). Children, however, do not only tell lies for self-serving purposes.
They also tell lies that are more prosocial in nature and are intended to
benet others. Lies told for the benet of others, including politeness lies,
loyalty lies, and altruistic lies (e.g., taking the blame for something one did
not do), seem to appear later and are told less frequently by children and
adults. Thus, over time, childrens early self-serving lie-telling matures to
include a broader focus and encompass additional less self-oriented
motivations, highlighting the need to consider the type of lie when dis-
cussing the development of childrens lie-telling behavior.
1. Antisocial Lies
Lies motivated by self-interest that violate trust and rules of communi-
cation and/or are intended to harm others or to avoid just punishment are
discussed here as antisocial lies (see Table I). Theoretically, these self-
serving lies ought to appear after a sense of self develops, as well as a rudi-
mentary understanding of mental states (e.g., Mom will be angry if she
knows I did something wrong). One must have a sense of self in order
to seek to protect oneself, as well as a rudimentary theory of mindthe
Table I
Taxonomy of Childrens Lies
Lie Developmental
taxonomy Denition timing Types of lies Open research questions
Antisocial Self-serving lies (e.g., to As young as age Lie to win a prize; lie to get How does antisocial lie-telling develop
deny wrongdoing, for two, for denials out of trouble or to punish over time? At what point does
personal gain, to harm another antisocial lying become problem
another) lying and how and for whom does
problem lying develop?
Prosocial Lies told for the benet of As young as age 3, Lie to be polite; lie to benet Are early prosocial lies truly prosocial
another (e.g., to be depending on another, despite cost to self or are they told to avoid upsetting
polite, for the benet of motivation someone/getting in trouble? Is the
another, to be altruistic) developmental trajectory of prosocial
lying similar to antisocial lying? Is
there problem prosocial lying?
Primary Deliberately untrue Twothree years, Tend to appear as denials or Is this behavior actually lying? Are such
statements; tend to be although still simple lies; may be lies intentional? To what extent do
denials of rule violations relatively rudimentary intentional lies children know what they are doing
and to avoid getting into infrequent when they tell early lies?
trouble
Secondary Readily tell a lie to conceal Four years Ability to tell intentional lies Why do some children continue to rely
their own transgressions to create a false belief in on this strategy over time? Is it related
another to the development of effective
emotion regulation?
Tertiary Increasing sophistication in Seven to eight Ability to plausibly maintain a When do children choose to lie, after they
maintaining lie years lie beyond a denial; lies have developed more powerful skills
plausibility; can ensure increasingly difcult to to lie effectively? Is this lie-telling
subsequent statements detect ability related to the 5- to 7-shift?
do not contradict their
lies; hard to detect
understanding that ones private deeds and thoughts are not evident to
others. Research ndings seem to be consistent with this hypothesis, as a
sense of self seems to develop at 1524 months (i.e., self recognition;
Lewis, Sullivan, Stanger, & Weiss, 1989), and rudimentary theory of mind
seems to be in place by 2 years of age (e.g., Moll & Tomasello, 2007;
Onishi & Baillargeon, 2005).
Children have been observed telling lies for self-protection as early
2 years of age (Newton et al., 2000), although experimental studies
examining childrens antisocial lies have focused mainly on preschool chil-
dren ages three and up (e.g., Lewis, Stanger, et al., 1989; Polak & Harris,
1999). These studies have typically relied on a modied temptation resis-
tance paradigm in which children are given the opportunity to commit a
transgression. For example, they are placed in room with an attractive
toy and instructed not to peek at the toy while the experimenter is absent
( 8090% of children do peek). They then have a naturalistic opportu-
nity to spontaneously lie when the experimenter returns and asks whether
or not the children peeked. Using such an experimental procedure mimics
the natural setting in which children lie and has allowed researchers to
examine childrens natural lie-telling abilities. Prior to procedural tec-
hniques such as the temptation resistance paradigm being used,
researchers used procedures where the subject was asked to lie about a
fact (e.g., Feldman, Jenkins, & Popoola, 1979; Feldman & White, 1980).
The trouble with such procedures is that they do not reect the naturally
covert nature of lying. Lying is a hidden behavior where the listener is not
supposed to know that the liar is trying to mislead them. If a lie is success-
ful, the listener should believe the statement and be unaware of the inten-
tion to deceive. Thus, asking the subject to lie creates an articial situation
different from the natural situations in which people tell day-to-day lies.
Similarly, observational studies of lying, while capturing natural lies, are
limited in that they only capture those lies that are detected by the
observer. Thus, the use of procedural paradigms in recent years, like the
modied temptation resistance paradigm, have allowed for more valid
examinations of childrens abilities to tell naturalistic lies.
Using their modied temptation resistance paradigm, Lewis, Stanger,
et al. (1989) found that 38% of 3-year-olds who peeked at the forbidden
toy denied peeking, while 38% confessed to peeking at the toy (the
remaining peekers chose not to answer when asked if they peeked). In a
similar study, Talwar and Lee (2002a) found that the majority of children
between 4 and 7 years of age lied about peeking at a toy, while two-thirds
of 3-year-olds confessed to their transgression. Together with observa-
tional studies, these ndings suggest that some children as young as
3 years of age, and most children by 4 years of age, can and will tell lies to
conceal transgressions and to escape potential punishment.
It is worth noting that this age pattern, in which 3-year-olds are relatively
less inclined to lie about their transgression than older children, has been
observed among American, Canadian, British, West African, and Chinese
children (Lewis, Stanger, et al., 1989; Polak & Harris, 1999; Talwar & Lee,
2002a, in press; Talwar, Lee, Bala, & Lindsay, 2002; Xu & Lee, 2007).
Hence, there is convergent evidence to suggest that this age pattern is a com-
mon, developmental phenomenon. Further evidence of the developmental
progress of childrens lies comes from other studies employing modied
temptation paradigms. Theses studies have shown that, with age, children
become better able to maintain their lies through follow-up questioning.
For example, it can be difcult to detect lies told by children 8 years
old and above due to the plausibility of their lies to conceal their
transgressions (Evans & Lee, 2011; Talwar, Gordon, et al., 2007; Talwar &
Lee, 2008).
Antisocial lies for personal reward also appear to emerge in the pre-
school years. In one study, children were taught to mislead a puppet about
the location of a prize in order to keep the prize for themselves (Sodian,
Taylor, Harris, & Perner, 1991). Children were reliably capable of com-
mitting this deception by 4 years of age. Similarly, Peskin (1992) found
that 87% of 5-year-olds lied about the location of a prize to a puppet,
while only 29% of 3-year-olds lied. Thus, evidence to date suggests a pro-
gression whereby preschool-aged children are increasingly capable of
telling deliberate lies for self-oriented reasons, with some children begin-
ning at 2 or 3 years of age (Lewis, Stanger, et al., 1989; Newton et al.,
2000; Talwar et al., 2002; Talwar & Lee, 2002a).
Lies told to keep another persons secrets might also be considered anti-
social lies if they are concealing a transgression. In one study (Wilson &
Pipe, 1989), an unfamiliar adult magician asked 5- and 6-year-olds to
conceal his accidenthe spilled ink on a pair of gloves. When interviewed
later, the children complied; they did not spontaneously mention the acci-
dent. In a similar study (Pipe & Wilson, 1994), 6- and 10-year-olds par-
ticipated in pairs with a magician, one as an assistant and the other as
a spectator. After the magician spilled the ink on the gloves, children were
asked to keep it a secret. When later asked about the event, 6-year-olds
were more likely than 10-year-olds to keep the magicians secret. That
is, 40% of younger children denied knowing about the accident, while
only 16% of older children denied the accident when asked directly. How-
ever, children who were directly implicated in the accident (assistants),
who might conceivably be blamed for it, were more likely to spontane-
ously report the accident than children who were only observers.
Thus, younger children were willing to lie for others, but only when the
lies did not conict with their self-interest.
It may be, however, that children are less likely to risk telling lies for a
stranger than for a trusted adult, where there may be interpersonal con-
sequences. That is, unlike an unfamiliar experimenter, children may be
highly motivated to lie for a parent with whom they have a close bond
to protect them from potential harm. Talwar, Lee, Bala, and Lindsay
(2004) studied children between 3 and 11 years of age telling lies for their
parents. In their study, parents committed a minor transgression (i.e.,
breaking a puppet) while the experimenter was out of the room. They
then coached their children not to tell anyone that the parent had broken
the puppet because the parent might get in trouble. Later, children were
interviewed about what happened. The majority of children told the truth
and did not conceal their parents transgression. However, children were
sensitive to the different conditions in which they were asked by their
parents to lie and adjusted their lie- and truth-telling behavior accordingly.
In particular, when it was apparent that the child would not be blamed for
the transgression, more children lied at the request of a parent. This, along
with the ndings of Pipe and Wilson (1994), suggests that when children
perceive that they are unlikely to be blamed for a transgression of prop-
erty damage (i.e., soiled gloves, a broken puppet), younger children are
more likely to conceal another persons transgression.
However, the parental transgression used by Talwar et al. (2004) was
very salient to the children, as the broken puppet lay in full view of the
interviewer and the child during questioning, perhaps challenging
childrens cognitive ability to lie. Bottoms, Goodman, Schwartz-Kenney,
and Thomas (2002) used a slightly different design. In their study, mothers
and children between 3 and 6 years of age again played with toys while the
experimenter was out of the room. Mothers broke one toy and then told
the child not to tell or she might get in trouble. But in this study, the trans-
gression was not evident during questioning because the mothers hid the
toy. Bottoms and colleagues found that older children were more likely
than younger children to withhold information about their mothers
playing with the forbidden toys. However, parents also coached their chil-
dren with an incentive, perhaps providing additional evidence for the
importance of self-interest in the development of childrens antisocial
lie-telling for others. Thus, the motivational context can affect childrens
antisocial lie-telling behavior, as they must assess the interpersonal con-
sequences to themselves and to others when deciding how to behave
(see also Sweet, Heyman, Fu, & Lee, 2010, for similar ndings in China).
It is also important to note that antisocial lie-telling does not typically
continue to increase in frequency throughout all of development. In fact,
it seems to peak during adolescence, declining thereafter to a relatively

low level in adulthood (Jensen, Arnett, Feldman, & Cauffman, 2004;
Keltikangas-Jarvinen & Lindeman, 1997; Serota, Levine, & Boster,
2010). This decrease in frequency in adulthood may reect adults
increased cognitive ability to adaptively deal with their social
environments without resorting to deceptive strategies, which are socially
condemned and risky behaviors that can damage ones own credibility. It
may also reect adults greater security in and social skills to survive in the
hierarchical social environment. However, as there is little longitudinal
research investigating the development and adaptiveness of lying from
childhood to adulthood, the exact trajectory of lying and what factors
might affect it remains unclear.
2. Prosocial Lies
Lies told for the benet of others, perhaps at personal cost, are here ter-
med prosocial lies (see Table I). These lies (sometimes called white lies)
are usually positively and socially motivated and are told without mali-
cious intent. Prosocial lies tend to be accepted by social conventions and
are evaluated less negatively than antisocial lies (Nyberg, 1993; Sweetser,
1987). Such lies appear to be unique to humans, and could be considered
the oil that greases the wheels of everyday social interactions. Prosocial
lies are interesting because they pit two conicting rules of communication
against each other. On one hand, a fundamental principle of communica-
tion is the maxim of quality, which requires speakers to be truthful and to
inform, not misinform, their communicative partners (Grice, 1980). Based
on this principle, listeners tend to expect speakers to be truthful and avoid
falsehood. Indeed, this is a very important assumption. On the basis of this
principle, in our everyday lives, we are able to assume that when we are
conversing with someone (e.g., a friend, a colleague, a stranger), they
are speaking the truth. If we could not assume this as part of our day-
to-day interactions, we could not trust anything anyone said and would
have to verify rst-hand all facts communicated to us by another. Viola-
tion of this norm of communication is considered grave and consequently
we consider those who lie untrustworthy. Indeed, emerging research on
trust in testimony indicates that even children are quite sensitive to the
reliability of a speaker when assessing the validity of that speakers
subsequent information (e.g., Corriveau & Harris, 2009; Koenig, Clment,
& Harris, 2004).
On the other hand, philosophers have argued that there exists an
equally, if not more fundamental rule that requires speakers to be amica-
ble and to help, not to harm, their communicative partners, what one
might call a meta-maxim of General Cooperation (Lakoff, 1973; Sweetser,

1987). This politeness rule can supersede the maxim of quality in polite-
ness situations (Lakoff, 1973; Lee & Ross, 1997; Sweetser, 1987). Lies told
for the sake of politeness abide by this meta-maxim, as do lies told altru-
istically. Thus, in some situations (e.g., receiving a disappointing gift for
your birthday), where maintaining and enhancing amicable social rel-
ations might be emphasized, these principles promote contradictory
behaviorsnamely being honest versus being helpful, not harmful. Exam-
ining polite lies provides a unique opportunity for understanding whether
children are capable of reconciling these seemingly contradictory
principles at both conceptual and behavioral levels, an ability likely
inuenced by their cognitive and social development.
To illustrate, telling a prosocial lie (e.g., for politeness) requires an
empathetic understanding of anothers mental state, as well as the ability
and desire to manipulate that mental state (e.g., Mom is anxious about
her appearance. I want her to feel better and she will if I tell her she looks
nice). This suggests that prosocial lie-tellers are more likely to engage in
socially appropriate conversations and perhaps to be more socially
accepted. Yet, children only seem to exhibit prosocial behaviors reliably
from early elementary school onward (Eisenberg & Fabes, 1998),
suggesting that prosocial lies appear later than antisocial lies, perhaps in
middle childhood (DePaulo & Jordan, 1982). However, evidence from
one study of 3- to 7-year-olds white lies indicates that some children
learn to tell prosocial lies earlier than expected (Talwar & Lee, 2002b).
In this study, a Reverse Rouge Task was used in which the experimenter
had a conspicuous mark of lipstick on the nose. The children were asked
to take a picture of the experimenter, but before the picture was taken,
the experimenter asked Do I look okay? This created a situation in
which the children needed to decide whether to tell a prosocial lie. Over-
all, 89% of the children gave an afrmative response to the
experimenters question, but later told a research assistant that they
thought the experimenter did not look okay. So some children can tell
prosocial lies from a very young age.
However, it may be that prosocial lies of this nature appear early
because of their self-protective quality. Such a lie serves two purposes: it
prevents embarrassment to the other person, but it also protects the liar
from the potential negative feelings directed toward them if they tell the
truth. In the Reverse Rouge situation, if children told the truth, they might
face negative reactions from the adult. Children had little to lose, but
much to gain by telling a lie in this situation. Thus, young children may
be motivated to learn these types of lies at a young age not only for pro-
social reasons, but for self-oriented reasons as well.
There are situations, however, in which children seem willing to lie, per-
haps to protect anothers feelings, despite detriment to their own self-
interests. Childrens behavior was examined in such a situation using an
undesirable gift-paradigm (Talwar, Murphy, & Lee, 2007). Here, children
played a game where they were promised a gift from a gift basket that
contained a range of different toys and gifts. After the game, children
received an undesirable gift of soap instead of a toy and were questioned
by the gift-giver about whether they liked the gift. In this situation, chil-
dren had to reconcile their desire for a better gift with the competing
social requirement to be polite. This procedure recreates common
situations that children are highly familiar with (e.g., receiving socks as a
Christmas gift from a relative) and where white lies are often deemed
socially desirable and truth-telling inappropriate. When asked, the major-
ity of children lied, claiming to like the disappointing gift and losing the
chance for a better gift, despite having told their parents that they did
not like the gift. However, school-aged children were more likely to tell
the prosocial lie than were preschool children. In a similar study
conducted in China, 40% of 7-year-olds and 50% of 9-year-olds told a
prosocial lie, while 60% of 11-year-olds told a prosocial lie (Xu, Boa,
Fu, Talwar, & Lee, 2010). Further, when asked why they lied, most youn-
ger lie-tellers were motivated to lie for nonprosocial reasons, such as to
avoid negative consequences for themselves (e.g., the gift-giver being
mad at them), whereas the majority of older lie-tellers were motivated
to lie for prosocial reasons, such as avoiding hurting the feelings of the
gift-giver. Hence, childrens ability to lie appears earlier than the willing-
ness to ignore self-interest in their lie-telling. This is further evidence of
the importance of the motivational context and the role of interpersonal
consequences in childrens truth- and lie-telling behavior.
Unlike other prosocial lies, which might benet the self by avoiding an
unpleasant situation, an altruistic lie is told solely for the benet of
another, with no expectation of reward, and perhaps at ones own expense
(Eisenberg, 1996) and requires cognitive perspective-taking ability and
sympathy (Eisenberg, Carlo, Murphy, & Van Court, 1995). It is not
known when in development children begin to engage in altruistic lying.
However, altruistic behavior seems to appear increasingly during the ele-
mentary school years and into early adolescence, as children both come to
require less external reinforcement to engage in such behavior and
become more aware of its intrinsically reinforcing nature (Cialdini,
Baumann, & Kenrick, 1981; Froming, Allen, & Jensen, 1985; Perry, Perry,
& Weiss, 1986). This occurs after general prosocial behavior appears,
suggesting later development of altruistic lie-telling (DePaulo & Jordan,
1982). Indeed, these lies are expected to appear last, developmentally
speaking, as they require the cognitive perspective-taking skills and empa-

thetic understanding noted above (Eisenberg et al., 1995), in addition to
an appreciation for the intangible benets of socially appropriate and/or
altruistic behavior, despite the potential cost to the self. This has yet to
be demonstrated empirically.
3. SummaryThe Development of Lying

Childrens lie-telling appears to emerge early in the preschool years as a
normal aspect of development. Their rst lies appear to be motivated by
the desire to avoid punishment or negative consequences and self-interest.
Lies told for others may also be told initially for self-protection and to
reduce harm to themselves. However, as children become older, they
are more likely to be concerned about the feelings and needs of others
and are more likely to tell lies that reduce harm to others. It is not until
middle and late childhood that children begin to tell lies for others when
there may be a cost to themselves, although the cost in most studies is
not extremely high (such as when children receive an undesirable gift).
Thus, lying behavior rst emerges as a strategy to reduce harm to oneself,
but as children grow older and start to conform to social norms and eti-
quette, telling prosocial lies becomes a useful strategy to maintain social
relationships, while self-interested lie-telling becomes more selective and
less frequent. Eventually, some children will tell lies that are solely for
the benet of another, even at personal cost.
C. COGNITIVE AND SOCIAL FACTORS INFLUENCING THE

DEVELOPMENT OF LYING
Further evidence that lying reects normal development comes from its
close association with other cognitive and developmental milestones. As
they mature, children acquire cognitive abilities that are essential to suc-
cessful lying, such as understanding that appearances can be deceiving
(Harris & Gross, 1988), and meta-representational abilities or theory of
mind. In addition, as children get older, they engage in more social
situations where they may practice their deceptive abilities. They likely
learn to deceive better through these experiences and by observing other
children use appropriate expressive display rules and emotional dis-
semblance (i.e., simulating or masking emotions). Further, lying is an
interpersonal exercise (Lee, 2000) and is developed through social inu-
ence as well as cognitive maturity. Parents may explicitly or implicitly
teach their children about the value of honesty and dishonesty.
To understand the basis for age-related differences in lie-telling behavior,

it is thus important to examine both cognitive and social factors that seem
related to the development of deception.
1. Meta-Representational Understanding
The majority of early work on lie-telling focused on whether childrens
meta-representational understanding might be related to their lie-telling
ability (Chandler, Fritz, & Hala, 1989; Polak & Harris, 1999; Talwar &
Lee, 2002a), as telling a lie successfully, particularly an elaborate lie,
requires creating a false belief in the mind of another. This requires the
understanding (Perner, 1991) that ones own knowledge differs from that
of a lie-recipient, whose knowledge can be manipulated through deceit.
Thus, some childrens lies may be evidence of their understanding of other
minds, or theory of mind. In fact, the ability to deceive has been seen as
one of the chief skills that children acquire when they have a full theory
of mind or meta-representational understanding (Frye & Moore, 1991).
Consistent with that perspective, children with an autism spectrum disor-
der (ASD) tend to have difculties telling lies (Baron-Cohen, 1992;
Sodian & Frith, 1992; Talwar et al., 2010). In other words, children with
ASD (in addition to children with other disabilities, such as mental retar-
dation; Sodian & Frith, 1992) who have poorly developed theory of mind
also tend to be poor liars, highlighting the probable link between theory of
mind and deception.
To understand that they can create false beliefs in others, children must
also appreciate that a persons mental perspective will have a causal
impact on his or her actions, statements, and emotions, even when that
perspective runs counter to current reality and cannot be derived from
it. However, extensive research on childrens meta-representational
understanding suggests that children under 4 years of age might not be
capable of understanding nor intentionally creating false beliefs in others
(Gopnik, 1993; Perner, 1991; Wellman, 1990; Wellman, Cross, & Watson,
2001; Wimmer & Perner, 1983), making them incapable of intentional
deception. Because children as young as 3 years of age have demonstrated
the ability to mislead others (Lewis, Sullivan, et al., 1989), the mechanism
for this capability is not yet clear, although one possibility is that this early
deceptive behavior reects childrens wishful thinking (e.g., Ahern, Lyon,
& Quas, 2011; Talwar & Lee, 2008).
Addressing this inconsistency, Talwar and Lee (2002a) suggest that
childrens false denials of wrongdoing (antisocial lies) only require the child
to represent a belief that is different from the true state of affairs. This would
indicate that false denial only requires understanding a rst-order
false belief. Arguably, this accounts for the consistent ndings that, while
over half of 3-year-olds (who generally lack theory of mind) tend not to
lie, the majority of children aged 4 and older will falsely deny their trans-
gressions (i.e., those likely to have theory of mind). This was further con-
rmed by ndings from Talwar and Lee (2008) who found that childrens
rst-order false belief understanding was related to their false denials.
However, when asked follow-up questions after their denials, children
need to infer what belief they ought to have, given their initial denial (a
belief based on a false belief) to sustain their lies. They must assess what
the lie-recipient will be able to infer from information the child reveals.
Thus, the task of feigning ignorance in subsequent verbal statements
might be considered akin to a second-order representational task (e.g.,
infer what belief the lie-recipient will think the liar ought to have based
upon their false belief; Polak & Harris, 1999; Talwar & Lee, 2002a,
2008), and children are able to understand second-order beliefs around
6 years of age (Hogrefe, Wimmer, & Perner, 1986; Perner & Wimmer,
1985). This is consistent with ndings that 6- and 7-year-olds are better
than younger children at maintaining their lies verbally when asked fol-
low-up questions (Talwar & Lee, 2002a), as are children scoring higher
on second-order false belief tasks (Talwar, Gordon, et al., 2007; Talwar
& Lee, 2008).
As a result of these ndings, Talwar and Lee (2008) suggested that
childrens lie-telling may progress through three levels (see Table I). First,
childrens primary lies begin around 23 years of age when children are
rst able to deliberately make factually untrue statements, which tend to
be about rule violations and to avoid getting into trouble. Given the fact
that genuine lies told by children in later childhood tend to serve similar
functions, such early falsehoods may be a rudimentary form of intentional
verbal deception. However, at this age, childrens lies are still infrequent
(Newton et al., 2000; Wilson et al., 2003), with approximately half of 3-
year-olds lying about their transgressions, while the remainder tend to
be honest and confess their transgression when asked by adults (e.g.,
Lewis, Stanger, et al., 1989; Polak & Harris 1999; Talwar & Lee, 2002a).
The second level, secondary lies, reects a signicant shift that takes
place between 3 and 4 years of age (Chandler et al., 1989; Peskin, 1992;
Polak & Harris, 1999). At around 4 years of age, the majority of children
will readily tell a lie to conceal their own transgressions. Childrens acqui-
sition of rst-order belief understanding may play an important role in
childrens progression from the rst to the second level. The third level,
tertiary lies, emerges around 78 years of age. At this level, children
become gradually more and more sophisticated at maintaining the plausi-
bility of their lies. Children will tell a deliberate lie while ensuring that
their subsequent statements do not contradict the initial lie, thus making
their statements difcult to distinguish from statements made by a non-
liar. Childrens second-order belief understanding appears to play an
important role in the transition from the secondary to the tertiary level.
This is perhaps because such understanding allows intentional social
coordination to occur (Perner, 1988, p. 272) such that children can reason
about complex interactions between mental states involved in sustaining a
lie and act appropriately. This shift from secondary to tertiary lies may
also reect the ve-to-seven shift that occurs in childrens maturing cogni-
tive capacities, self-concept, self-regulation, memory, and social abilities,
as well as the changes in their interpersonal relationships (Sameroff &
Haith, 1996).
While most studies that have explored the relation between theory of
mind understanding and lying have examined childrens lies to conceal
transgressions or trickery, none has examined the relation to prosocial
lying. However, it has been suggested that childrens prosocial lie-telling
may be related to their second-order false belief understanding as well
(Broomeld et al., 2002). These socially based lies require an empathetic
understanding of anothers mental state as different from ones own and
understanding of ones ability to alter that mental state. Thus, the evolving
nature of understanding others minds (i.e., theory of mind) likely relates
to the different developmental trajectories of antisocial versus prosocial
lie-telling, as protecting oneself via false denial does not require the same
degree of cognitive sophistication as imagining and inuencing how
another person feels.
2. Executive Functioning
Childrens executive functioning is another cognitive factor likely
associated with the development of childrens lying. Executive function
has been dened as higher-order psychological processes involved in
goal-oriented behavior under conscious control (Zelazo & Muller, 2002).
Executive functioning encompasses a collection of cognitive skills includ-
ing self-regulation, inhibitory control, planning, attentional exibility,
strategy employment, and inuence (Welsh, Pennington, & Groisser,
1991; Zelazo, Carter, Reznick, & Frye, 1997). Executive functioning skills
have been shown to emerge in late infancy and develop during the child-
hood years (Welsh & Pennington, 1988; Zelazo & Muller, 2002), a time
when researchers have noted increases in lie-telling skill (e.g., Polak &
Harris, 1999; Talwar & Lee, 2002a). In particular, it has been suggested
that inhibitory control, working memory, and planning may be directly
related to childrens deception (Carlson & Moses, 2001; Carlson, Moses,

& Hix, 1998). Such a relation may also be mediated by theory of mind
development (Carlson, Moses, & Breton, 2002; Sabbagh, Xu, Carlson,
Moses, & Lee, 2006).
Inhibitory control is the ability to suppress interfering thought processes
or actions (Carlson et al., 2002) and working memory is a system for tem-
porarily holding and processing information in the mind (Baddeley, 1986).
When lying, children must suppress their reporting of the information that
they wish to conceal and utter the false information that differs from real-
ity (Carlson et al., 1998, 2002). Additionally, to maintain their lies, chil-
dren must inhibit those thoughts and statements that are contrary to
their lie, while maintaining in their memory the contents of their lie. Thus,
children must hold conicting alternatives in their mind (i.e., what they
really did/thought and what they said they did/thought). Maintaining a
lie also requires an element of planning, as liars must prepare their story
prior to reporting it in order to appear convincing to their audience.
Few studies have examined the relation between childrens executive
functioning and deceptive behavior (Carlson et al., 1998; Talwar & Lee,
2007). Carlson et al. (1998) found that preschool children who experience
difculty with executive functioning tasks, especially those that require a
high level of inhibitory control, also have difculty with deception tasks.
Talwar and Lee (2008) reported evidence of a relation between childrens
lie-telling to conceal a transgression and executive functioning, as children
with higher stroop task scores were more likely to lie. Hence, childrens
maturing executive functioning skills seem to facilitate their successful
lie-telling. However, there has yet to be a systematic study of childrens
lie-telling in relation to the various executive functioning skills. Further
examination of the role of executive function skills in the development
and maintenance of childrens lie-telling behavior is needed, especially
as research suggests that individual differences in lie-telling may be
related to their ability to regulate their behavior and deal with the cogni-
tive load of lying (Clemens et al., 2010). Given the complex nature of
lying, it is likely that childrens growing executive functioning skills will
play a signicant role in its development.
3. IQ
IQ is likely related to childrens lie-telling capacity as well, although
ndings regarding the nature of the relation are contradictory. Whereas
McFarlane, Allen, and Honzik (1962) found no consistent relation
between IQ and lying, Rutter (1967) found that truthfulness was related
to higher IQ scores and Shepard and colleagues (1971) found that lying
was related to lower IQ scores. However, a study using the temptation
resistance paradigm found that young children with higher IQ scores were
more likely to tell antisocial lies than children with lower IQ scores (Lewis
& Crossman, 2003), and adults in a study of lying on personality tests
showed similar results (Pauls & Crost, 2005). In addition, IQ predicts
childrens false belief understanding, which could partially mediate its
relation to the ability to tell an effective, consistent lie (antisocial and pro-
social). Finally, it is possible that children with higher IQ scores are more
resistant to temptation (i.e., less likely to need to lie) and better at lying
when the need arises, such that they are detected less often
(Stouthamer-Loeber, 1986).
4. Socio-Familial, Dispositional, and Cultural Factors

Despite the limitations of the literature described above, most of the
existing studies on individual differences in lie-telling have explored lying
in relation to cognitive factors (e.g., Chandler et al., 1989; Peskin, 1992;
Polak & Harris, 1999), with little concurrent consideration of social or
environmental characteristics (see Stouthamer-Loeber, 1986). Yet, lying
is an interpersonal exercise and is developed through social inuence as
well as cognitive maturity. From very young ages, children are socialized
to be honest and truthful in most social contexts. Lying is a morally and
socially undesirable behavior that is actively discouraged, violates social
conventions of communication (e.g., to be truthful), and is judged very
negatively. However, children are also taught, implicitly or explicitly, that
they should not always tell the blunt truth. In some situations, lying is
inappropriate (e.g., to conceal a transgression) and is actively discouraged,
but in others, it serves a socially appropriate function and is used to
uphold social conventions (e.g., to be polite)and these can vary across
families and across cultures (e.g., Lee, Cameron, Xu, Fu, & Board, 1997;
Seiter, Bruschke, & Bai, 2002), highlighting the relevance of these factors
to the development of lying. Research suggests that children appreciate
these differences early and increasingly with age (Bussey, 1992, 1999;
Lee & Ross, 1997). However, the inuence of various social, dispositional,
and cultural factors on how children internalize the rules and conventions
for lie-telling needs to be further explored.
Concealing ones true feelings and opinions about others in some social
situations is one aspect of etiquette to which children must learn to
adhere. For example, when meeting a person with an unusual appearance
(e.g., physical deformity), many children are told not to stare at or speak
bluntly about the unusual appearance; rather, they are socialized to act
and speak normally. Sometimes, they are even encouraged to tell white
lies, perhaps to be polite (e.g., when receiving a gift that they dislike;
Talwar, Murphy, & Lee 2007). By preschool age, most children have
begun to learn that some types of lies are more acceptable than others,
depending on the context (Peterson et al., 1983), with some parents
modeling, perhaps even encouraging, prosocial lies as preferable to the
truth (Eisenberg & Murphy, 1995; Talwar et al., 2007). In these cases,
deceptive emotional expression is encouraged, as children are socialized
to hide or mask negative emotions that are deemed unacceptable, a skill
that facilitates effective deception (Saarni & von Salisch, 1993).
Children who are more aware of their own self-presentation may have
an advantage in developing this skill. That is, self-conscious children with
heightened awareness of their own internal thoughts and states, and of
their own observable characteristics (e.g., How do I look?), may learn
how to mask their negative emotions earlier than other children. Self-con-
scious adults tend to believe that their own feelings are particularly trans-
parent to others (Gilovich, Savitsky, & Medvec, 1998; Vorauer & Ross,
1999). Similarly, highly self-conscious children may be more sensitive to
the self-presentation involved in lying, possibly pushing them to master
the skill (especially masking of inappropriate emotions) earlier than other
children to avoid detection. Thus, self-consciousness is one potential mod-
erator of the effects of socialization on the development of deception,
although this and other dispositional factors (e.g., empathy, social desir-
ability) remain understudied as potential sources of inuence on childrens
lie-telling.
Since parents and others might overtly encourage children to lie in
some contexts, but not others (Cole & Mitchell, 1998; Talwar, Murphy,
et al., 2007; Talwar & Lee, 2002b), one of the goals of socialization is
for children to discern the lie-telling etiquette of their culture. Yet, in
some cultures, different types of lies may be considered more acceptable
or even desirable than in other cultures. For instance, Lee et al. (1997)
found that with age, Chinese children were likely to rate lies about ones
good deeds more positively compared to Canadian children. This reected
childrens increasing awareness of their cultures conventions about mod-
esty and self-effacement in prosocial deed situations. Similarly, Fu, Xu,
Cameron, and Lee (2007) found that, as age increased, 7- to 11-year-old
Chinese children increasingly rated lies to benet the collective more pos-
itively than lies told to benet an individual, while Western children
showed the opposite preference. Thus, childrens evaluations of lies and
behavior may be inuenced by the cultural context in which they are
socialized and, with age, their conceptions and behaviors become more
in line with the cultural norms of the society in which they live.
Such research highlights the importance and the need for more research
to examine how cultural norms inuence childrens lie-telling behavior.
With the exception of a few studies (e.g., Fu, Evans, Wang, & Lee,
2008; Lee et al., 1997; Xu et al., 2010), the majority of studies on childrens
lie-telling behavior have been conducted in North America with primarily
middle-class, well-educated samples. Further research is needed to exam-
ine both inter- and intra-cultural inuences on the development of
childrens lie-telling behavior.
The most proximal of cultural inuences, of course, come through direct
socialization. Yet, few studies have examined relations between socializa-
tion factors and childrens lie-telling behaviors. Different familial sociali-
zation factors and practices may differentially associate with childrens
lie-telling behavior and little research has examined this possibility. One
study of the prevalence of boys reported antisocial lies found an associa-
tion with maternal rejection (Stouthamer-Loeber & Loeber, 1986). It also
has been suggested that a control-oriented family environment (Jensen
et al., 2004) and exposure to a harsh disciplinary style might predict the
development of antisocial deception, as children seek to avoid severe
punishments for their otherwise minor, impulse-driven transgressions
(Lewis, 1993; Stouthamer-Loeber, 1986; Talwar & Lee, in press). In a
recent study, Talwar and Lee (in press) found that children who attended
a school with a harsh disciplinary code were more likely to lie than other
children. Thus, rather than resolving the stage-salient developmental
task of adopting appropriate self-control strategies (Rogosch, Cicchetti,
& Aber, 1995, p. 594), children rely on the more primitive strategy of
lie-telling, which becomes maladaptive. Lower socio-economic status
(SES) also might predict childrens antisocial lying, although ndings are
mixed (Achenbach & Edelbrock, 1981; Stouthamer-Loeber & Loeber,
1986). Similarly, greater levels of parenting stress and single parent family
structure in the home may be related to childrens lie-telling indirectly,
through less adaptive parenting (Cole & Mitchell, 1998). Overall, these
results suggest that antisocial lies may develop earlier and be relied on
more extensively among children from harsh, chaotic, or high-risk family
environments. However, the relations of these suggested factors to lie-
telling have not yet been systematically examined in combination.
Prosocial lying might be associated with different socio-familial factors
than antisocial lying. In fact, prosocial lies (e.g., white lies) told to pro-
tect ones feelings are often modeled by parents as acceptable and even
preferable to the truth (Eisenberg & Murphy, 1995). It has been suggested
that authoritative parents foster the development of their childrens effec-
tive social skills, leading their children to become more frequent and apt
prosocial liars (Talwar & Lee, 2002b). Others have suggested that
parental warmth and authoritarian parenting may increase honesty

(Burton, 1963; Popliger, Talwar, & Crossman, in press; Stouthamer-
Loeber, 1986). However, given that prosocial lies reect both social and
emotional understanding, it seems likely that children exposed to parent-
ing that facilitates such understanding (Meins et al., 2002; Talwar et al.,
2007) will be more frequent and procient prosocial liars, possibly at
younger ages. Indeed, Talwar and colleagues (2007) reported that chil-
dren whose parents discussed the feelings of lie-recipients were more
likely to tell convincing prosocial lies, while a recent study found that pro-
social lying in children was positively related to authoritative parenting
and negatively to family emotional expressiveness (Popliger et al., in
press).
5. Summary
Deception seems to reect childrens emerging cognitive maturity as
they begin to understand others mental states and behaviors, while
learning to control their own. However, children also receive important
input from their social environments that shapes their lie-telling behavior,
in part as a reection of their individual abilities and dispositions. In par-
ticular, lying seems to be actively socialized, with prosocial lies condoned
and perhaps encouraged as appropriate, while antisocial lies are initially
ignored, and later discouraged and perceived as a sign of maladjustment.
Arguably, it is possible that in situations of high personal risk (e.g., abu-
sive households), children initially develop lying as an appropriate strat-
egy to avoid unpredictable, harsh punishments, but with time and across
social contexts, it becomes a problem behavior.
Given the competing social and cultural messages about lying, children
have the difcult task of interpreting this information to direct their moral
understanding and behavior appropriately. As they begin to understand
what lying is conceptually, they must learn when lie-telling is right and
when it is wrong, morally. They also must learn when it is acceptable
and/or appropriate, socially and practically. And they must learn how to
lie effectively, when they do lie. To prevent this normative process from
becoming problematic, the question becomes how to create among chil-
dren the social obligation to tell the truth and remove obstacles to their
honesty.
From surveys of adult lie-telling, it seems relatively clear that, while lie-
telling is common, the lions share of lie-telling emanates from a small
number of individuals (Serota et al., 2010). To understand the develop-
mental course of lying and why it is maintained as an occasional behavior
in some and develops into a chronic behavior in others, it is necessary to
develop a richer understanding of the role of the social environment on

childrens lie-telling behavior. Further exploration of the relations among
socialization factors and childrens honesty will help to address the practi-
cal question about how to foster honesty among childrenand ultimately,
among adults.
III. Developing a Conceptual Framework of Lying
Despite widespread interest in the conceptual and behavioral develop-

ment of childrens lie-telling, there does not yet exist a comprehensive,
transactional model of the development of deception among children.
As research on childrens lie-telling behavior has only recently begun to
explore the cognitive and social factors that inuence the development
of lying, it is likely that, ultimately, converging results from studies of chil-
dren across development will be combined effectively to dene and sup-
port a theoretically meaningful model to explain the development of
deception and to predict problem lying. A nascent outline of such a con-
ceptual model follows.
Social domain theory (Turiel, 1983) suggests that childrens social
knowledge and reasoning is heterogeneous, distinguishing moral, social-
conventional and personal acts and their consequences, and that childrens
social knowledge is constructed through their experiences across these
domains (Smetana, 1999). Lie-telling is a multifaceted social behavior, as
it engages reasoning in more than one domain (Smetana, 2006); antisocial
and prosocial lies violate moral rules, but prosocial truths violate social-
conventional rules. Differentiating, understanding, and internalizing these
social rules typically occur with development, facilitated by childrens
interactions with parents and others, as well as childrens growing cogni-
tive maturity (Smetana, 1999). Thus, children likely develop their under-
standing of lie-telling through a combination of social experiences over
time and cognitive development.
In terms of their experience, to give an example, children tend to violate
moral rules more often with peers and social-conventional rules more often
with mothers (Smetana, 1989). In response to social-conventional trans-
gressions, authoritative mothers emphasize social order, while they empha-
size consequences to the welfare or rights of victims for moral transgressions
(Smetana, 1999). As children begin to experiment with lying, authoritative
parents might respond to antisocial lies as moral violations and focus on
the harm. Prosocial truths, however, might elicit instruction on social mores,
such as If you cant say anything nice, dont say anything at all. In theory,
children acquire social knowledge through this type of interaction with their
environment. However, parents who are not authoritative do not seem to

show domain consistency in their responses to social transgressions. Thus,
such parents might send mixed messages, blurring childrens domain
distinctions of social knowledge as a result. There is some evidence that
behaviorally disturbed children (e.g., children with conduct disorder) might
show such confusion (Smetana, 2006). This is consistent with the nding
among adults that a few liars tell most of the lies, and that chronic lying
seems to begin by around age 7 (Gervais, Tremblay, Desmarais-Gervais,
& Vitaro, 2000; Serota et al., 2010). Nevertheless, this alone does not explain
the emergence of early deceptive behavior, how that understanding
becomes rich and nuanced, or how children develop an understanding of
deceptive strategies.
Cognitively, as described above, numerous factors might facilitate
childrens social knowledge learning and subsequent lie-telling skill. For
example, recent evidence suggests that childrens conceptual structures
might change in response to experience through domain general cognitive
adaptation abilities (Sabbagh, Hopkins, Benson, & Flanagan, 2010), key
to theory of mind development. One might gain such experience through
lie-telling success and failure, shaping the understanding and practice of
intentional, strategic lying over time. Those most cognitively adept (and
probably as a result, with the strongest theory of mind) might be the
earliest to understand deception. This pertains to lie-telling behavior, as
McCarthy and Lee (2009) found that children who understand the cues
to deception might be able to manipulate these cues to lie successfully.
Thus, understanding strategic deception is also likely to be an important
predictor of effective lie-telling.
Childrens reections are important when considering the interaction
between their experiences and cognitive abilities as well. That is, children
both construct and respond to their environments, perhaps discounting a
domain-inconsistent response to their social-conventional transgression,
for example (Smetana, 2006). Thus, individual characteristics and dis-
positions might inuence childrens developing understanding of decep-
tion. A self-aware child might recognize the behaviors needed for skilled
deception earlier than others. Similarly, meta-cognitive awareness might
allow some children to grasp an understanding of what deception means
and how to do it effectively at younger ages. This awareness is an impor-
tant aspect of lie-telling, as older children are more likely to plan inten-
tional lies than younger children (perhaps as a form of decision control;
Clemens et al., 2010), and liars are strategic in their attempts to lie effec-
tively, while truth-tellers tend to expect their honesty to shine through
(Strmwall, Granhag, & Landstrm, 2007). This psychology of guilt and
innocence has yet to be fully examined among children but is likely to
inform understanding of the inuence of meta-cognitive factors on

childrens understanding of strategic deception.
1. SummaryDeveloping a conceptual framework of lying

Overall, it seems that both social experience with their environments,
their own dispositions, and childrens developing cognitive and meta-cog-
nitive maturity interact in complex ways, over time, to predict their nor-
mative lying behavior, their understanding of deception and, for some,
later problem lying.
It will be important to further develop and rene a transactional model
of the development of deception to begin to understand and explain why
and how normative lying transforms into a problem behavior.
IV. Lying as a Problem Behavior
Although early lying appears to be related to adaptive cognitive and

social functioning in early childhood, as noted above, lying can become
a problem behavior as children reach late childhood and adolescence.
Specically, childrens lie-telling behavior can become clinically signicant
due to its frequency, inappropriate use, and consequences. However,
there has yet to be devised a comprehensive model of the development
of deception that addresses problematic lying. As discussed earlier, there
are a number of factors that are likely inuential in the initial develop-
ment of lying. Further, childrens behavior is doubtless informed by their
own experiences and learning as well, both about deception directly and
about their social world. There are also likely to be various inuences that
maintain chronic lie-telling once it starts, which differ from those that
supported the behavior initially (Stouthamer-Loeber, 1986). Some of
these likely include social, cognitive, and individual child characteristics.
However, in general, although chronic lying starts early, it is not yet
possible to reliably predict which children will evolve into prolic liars
as adults.
Among children, a relatively small percentage develops into chronic
liars. For instance, Stouthamer-Loeber (1986) reported that 3% of her
sample of troubled youths was identied as chronic liars. However, these
children often have additional behavioral problems as a group (Gervais
et al., 2000; Stouthamer-Loeber, 1986; Wilson & Carroll, 1991). That is,
frequent lying has been related to aggressiveness, conduct disorder, and
delinquency (Achenbach & Edelbrock, 1979, 1981; Ostrov, Ries,
Stauffacher, Godleski, & Mullins, 2008; Rutter, 1967; Stouthamer-Loeber
& Loeber, 1986), and Gervais et al. (2000) reported that persistent liars
had higher disruptive behavior ratings by both their teachers and their
mothers than other children.
Also, lying is included in the DSM-IV as a symptom of several patho-
logical entities (e.g., conduct disorder, factious disorders with psychologi-
cal or physical symptoms, antisocial personality disorder). The most
common clinical presentation of a child who is a persistent liar is conduct
disorder and approximately two-thirds of children with conduct disorder
include lying as one of their presenting problems (Stouthamer-Loeber,
1986). Further, the correlation between lying and conduct problems
increases with age (Stouthamer-Loeber & Loeber, 1986). The source
and direction of the association, however, are unclear.
Chronic lie-telling among children seems to be partly a function of cog-
nitive and social immaturity. That is, among older children, chronic lying
tends to be associated with antisocial behavior and delinquency (Gervais
et al., 2000; Stouthamer-Loeber & Loeber, 1986). Among younger chil-
dren, increases in lie-telling seem to follow increases in aggressive
behaviors (Ostrov et al., 2008). It is likely, then, that both chronic lie-
telling and other antisocial behaviors emerge from insufcient develop-
ment of adaptive behavioral strategies (e.g., self-regulatory control, con-
science) and instead reect reliance on immature strategies (e.g.,
impulsive behavior, previously adaptive lie-telling).
One possible contributor to the etiology of chronic lying is that some
childrens early lying is not effectively deterred, or perhaps is extremely
successful, such that they suffer a developmental cost from their lying.
That is, they come to rely on lying as their go to self-protective strategy
following wrongdoing, to the exclusion of other strategies. They may excel
at this skill and fail to fully develop their cognitive and self-regulatory
skills and conscience, which would help them to avoid the need for lies
in the rst place. This might be particularly likely among children with
insufcient parental supervision (decreasing the chances that their lies
would be detected) and might also be related to insufcient parental
warmth, inconsistent discipline, and/or parental power assertion, which
could undermine conscience and moral development in general
(Stouthamer-Loeber, 1986).
Similarly, lying could be a secondary behavior used to cover up other
primary antisocial acts and, as such, be a product of other aspects of
maladjustment. This has been supported in a short-term (4 months), lon-
gitudinal study of preschoolers (mean age 44 months). Ostrov et al.
(2008) found that both physical and relational aggression among young
children were associated with concurrent and prospective increases in
lying. Primary antisocial acts tend to be associated with family
environments characterized by harsh and inconsistent discipline, little pos-

itive parental involvement, and poor monitoring (Loeber & Dishion, 1983;
McCord, McCord, & Howard, 1963). Children from such environments
suffer from cognitive decits and distortions, including poor self-control,
impulsivity, and inability to delay gratication (Coy, Speltz, DeKlyen, &
Jones, 2001; Fontaine, Burks, & Dodge, 2002). Their focus on short-term
benets and immediate gratication may lead these children to be more
likely to commit transgressions impulsively, such as aggression, which they
later attempt to conceal through deception. For instance, in older children,
researchers have found a relation between antisocial behavior and failure
to complete homework assignments (Dishion, Loeber, Stouthamer-
Loeber, & Patterson, 1983; Fehrmann, Keith, & Reimers, 1987). Similarly,
children with fetal alcohol syndrome, who commonly have aggressive and
other behavior problems as well as low inhibitory control, may be more
likely to tell antisocial lies, presumably to conceal their misdeeds
(Rasmussen, Talwar, Loomes, & Andrew, 2007). However, more research
is needed to examine the relations among cognitive delays, behavioral
problems, and childrens lie-telling behavior.
In addition, children with behavioral problems may have limited prob-
lem-solving skills and be more likely to rely on relatively few self-regulation
and self-protective strategies. They may repeatedly use strategies like lying
and aggression that work in the short term, but not in the long term, as
others perceptions of them diminish. Moreover, because children with
antisocial behavior may be oblivious to how others make them feel and to
the negative consequences of their own behaviors for themselves and others
(Coie & Jacobs, 2000; Patterson, Kupersmidt, & Griesler, 1990), these
children may see lying as a useful strategy and not realize or care that the
strategy is not effective. They may use lie-telling in manipulative and
destructive ways, creating harm to themselves and those around them, with
minimal perception of the consequences. Indeed, some children become
extremely skilful at both prosocial and antisocial deception. When used to
facilitate manipulation and socially unacceptable ends, this is considered a
sign of psychopathology.
Lying is also central to the clinical malingering of physical or psychiatric
symptoms. Although this behavior is rare, older children and adolescents
are most likely to malinger (Quinn, 1988). In these cases, consistent with
social-cognitive theory, children or adolescents lie to mitigate negative
environmental factors or to receive some gain. Rogers (1990) suggested
that individuals malinger because they feel they have something to lose
from self-disclosure or something to gain from malingering, while at the
same time not perceiving a more effective means to achieve their desired
goal. Thus, a youth might decide to avoid punishment by pretending to be
unt to stand trial due to mental illness. Another might seek admission to
a hospital to obtain a safe place with free room and board (Quinn, 1988).
Individuals are most likely to malinger when there is a perceived adversar-
ial context, the personal stakes are high, and they perceive no other viable
alternatives. Lying (and often truth-telling) in these cases can have
extremely negative outcomes.
Much less rare (though perhaps less severe) are the personal con-
sequences of frequent lying in the absence of other antisocial motives or
behaviors. While there are potential costs associated with any lie-telling,
these costs generally come when one is unsuccessful in deception and is
caught, with immediate consequences due to the hidden information being
discovered. There is also the social cost of losing credibility. Lying violates
one of the most fundamental conventions governing interpersonal com-
munication, the maxim of quality, which states that one should be truthful
and inform, not misinform, communicative partners (Grice, 1980).
Chronic lying can result in a loss of trust that jeopardizes social
relationships, creates a negative image and even dislike for the liar as
one lacking integrity or credibility and can possibly lead to social isolation,
perpetuating the childs inappropriate behaviors, including lying (Tyler,
Feldman, & Reichert, 2006). This can arise for both excessive antisocial
or prosocial lie-telling. That is, ones opinion might no longer be consulted
once it is revealed that the individual never offers an honest opinion. Sim-
ilarly, one who lies frequently to get out of trouble will not be believed
when denying later wrongdoing. Thus, frequent lying of any type can be
a problem behavior, when the lie-teller loses credibility.
V. From Normative to Problem BehaviorAnd Back Again?
Overall, these ndings suggest that lie-telling is initially a normative

aspect of development that, for some children, can become a problem
behavior. While research on the development of lying is still in its
nascence, the evidence to date suggests that it is a complex behavior that
can be contextualized and even shaped within a social domain theory.
First, it seems clear that lying emerges early in development, in part to
protect the individual from negative/adverse environmental reactions, as
well as to serve self-interests. To these ends, early lie-telling is an adaptive
strategy, as it allows one to navigate the environment and acquire ones
goals. Children also broaden their repertoire of lie types, to include more
prosocial motivations by the mid to late elementary school years.
These lies are used as a social strategy to regulate and maintain their
social relationships. Skill with earlier forms of lie-telling might pave the
way for the later, more acceptable forms of deception.
Early lying appears to be associated with childrens developing cogni-
tive sophistication. As they develop a better understanding of self and of
others mental states as well as increased inhibitory control and working
memory, childrens ability to tell convincing lies increases. Children with
greater cognitive sophistication are better able to manipulate others,
maintain their feigned stories, and avoid aversive events (e.g., being
punished for breaking a vase, or upsetting a friend because you dislike
their gift). Moreover, effective early lying is related to childrens growing
social knowledge across domains, their abilities to understand the needs of
others, experience empathy, and respect social rules and norms. To the
extent that lie-telling is correlated with the development of these skills,
it is an adaptive behavior reecting childrens increasing ability to cope
with the demands of the environment. Thus, the emergence and initial
development of lie-telling reects childrens acquisition of socially appro-
priate behaviors.
How lying as a strategy is maintained (or abandoned), however, is also
shaped by socio-familial and environmental factors. Children are
socialized to know when lying is culturally appropriate. While children
begin spontaneously, at very young ages, to lie for personal gain or protec-
tion, parents eventually discourage such lies. Yet, they encourage other
kinds of lies, at times through modeling (e.g., parent calls in sick to
attend a sporting event), demonstrating to their children the utility of such
lies. Children also learn strategies to avoid extremely aversive outcomes
through deception, perhaps because of parents (e.g., abusive parents) or
through others (Talwar et al., 2004), including siblings and peers (Wilson
et al., 2003). It is even possible that they learn through observing highly
publicized instances of public lying, although these are likely so infrequent
and distal as to have minimal ongoing impact on early development. Nev-
ertheless, over time, most children learn to effectively interact with and
manage their social environments and relations in ways that do not
require frequent lying. Children whose parents foster childrens self-con-
trol, model honesty, and teach the positive consequences of truth-telling
will use lying only as an occasional strategy, while typically employing
more effective cognitive and social skills to maintain their social
relationships. Indeed, evidence suggests that lying has an adaptive value
as a social strategy only if it is used sparingly (Tyler et al., 2006). Thus, it
may be that the developmental trajectory of lying as a normative behavior
follows an inverted u-shaped function. That is, childrens lie-telling might
increase to a peak in elementary school, as their cognitive abilities develop,
and then decrease thereafter due to socialization processes of parents,

peers, and others, to the level of occasional lie-telling found in adults.
Chronic lie-telling, however, is related to negative, maladjusted
behaviors. This is particularly true for antisocial lie-telling, which falls
within the moral domain and raises questions about the character of the
liar and invites clinical intervention. Chronic lie-telling brings children into
more conict with their environment, creates negative perceptions among
others that they are insincere and untrustworthy, and in an extreme form
is considered to be a sign of psychopathology. Children who lack cognitive
maturity may not learn to use this social strategy appropriately, leading to
others negative impressions of them, or nd that they need to use this
strategy so often to cover their behavior that it becomes symptomatic of
their maladjustment and conicts with their environment.
Whether children decide to deceive in a situation is based on an assess-
ment of whether doing so will result in a positive or favorable outcome in
adverse circumstances (e.g., reduced punishment or no hurt feelings). The
decision to be honest or to lie depends, in part, on whether a particular
action will lead to attainment of some goal, regardless of whether or not
the goal is functional (Rogers, 1990), and the weighting of various factors
in such a cost/benet analysis likely changes with age. For instance, the
youngest children may simply consider the likely punishment involved
when choosing to lie. Adolescents, however, may weigh the likelihood
of getting caught as well as parental disappointment if they were caught
in the lie, which could serve as a strong deterrent for some (Stouthamer-
Loeber, 1986).
According to Banduras (1986, 1991) social-cognitive theory of moral
thought and action, there is an important link between the inuence of
socializing agents and childrens cognitions about lying. Bandura argues
that congruence between moral behavior and moral standards is pro-
moted through the engagement of self-evaluative reactions. Specically,
children choose how to behave based on the degree to which they expect
self-approval (e.g., pride) or self-disapproval (e.g., shame) as a result of
that behavior. It is argued that these internal evaluative reactions are nec-
essary for the development of self-regulatory control of lying and truth-
telling (Bussey & Bandura, 1999). Children go through a process of social-
ization as they begin to internalize moral standards held by their parents
and society. Bandura (1986) stated that childrens behavior is inuenced
by both external and internal factors. Young children rely on guidance
from others to encourage their behaviors either through external physical
factors (i.e., punishments) or external social factors (i.e., social rewards for
pleasing another person), and as children internalize the moral standards,
they also come to be affected by internal social factors (i.e., pleasing one-
self by doing the right thing).
Based on conscience development and internalization of standards, the
development of such internal evaluative reactions is gradual. While youn-
ger children may lie to avoid punishment for their misdeeds (to avoid neg-
ative external evaluations), older childrens lying and truth-telling might
primarily be guided by sensitivity to and anticipation of evaluative
reactions to their lying and truthfulness (internal and external). Accord-
ingly, as a child develops cognitively and socially, more reliance is placed
on the internal factors associated with truth-telling, such as pride, and less
is placed on external factors such as punishment (Bandura, 1986). More-
over, older childrens more developed conscience arguably facilitates their
inhibitory behavior, reducing need for antisocial lie-telling, but enhances
the desire to avoid hurting others through use of prosocial lies. This the-
ory has received some support, as Bussey (1992) found that older children
anticipated more feelings of pride for truthfulness than for lie-telling in
antisocial situations. Wagland and Bussey (2005) found when punishment
was expected children predicted that both external (social approval) and
internal encouragement (pleasing ones internal standards of behavior)
would increase truth-telling behavior, compared to no encouragement.
Therefore, childrens lie-telling behavior and the maintenance of lying as
an occasional, situation-specic behavior versus a frequently used strategy
may depend on the inuence of socializing agents on childrens cognitions
and attributions about lying. While younger children may lie to avoid pun-
ishment for their misdeeds (perhaps without the intent to lie; or perhaps
to assert what they wish to be true), older childrens lying and truth-telling
may be primarily guided by anticipation of evaluative reactions to their
truthfulness and lies.
Given concerns about the development of childrens lying as a problem
behavior, particularly in the moral domain (i.e., antisocial lies), it is likely
that this social-cognitive theory of childrens moral behavior could be trans-
lated into effective means of fostering childrens truth-telling. Indeed, pre-
liminary ndings suggest that even very young childrens honesty can be
increased by exposing them to models of reward for truth-telling, while
modeling punishment for lying does not increase honesty (Talwar &
Arruda, 2011). Specically, Talwar and Arruda (2011) found that children
were less likely to lie about a transgression when their interrogators
appealed to either external or internal motivations to tell the truth (as
opposed to external consequences). Recognizing and helping to develop
childrens self-evaluative motivations could thus help adults build social
incentives for truth-telling and remove competing social barriers to honesty.
A. SUMMARY
It is important to understand how lying is socialized to be exhibited in

socially acceptable ways for some, while for others it transforms from
socially acceptable to a socially unacceptable behavior that harms the indi-
vidual and others, putting him in conict with his/her environment. When
childrens early, self-serving lies are not detected, the strategy is
reinforced and rewarded. When childrens lies are detected and when they
experience the effects of the lies they and others tell, as well as receiving
socialization about the importance of honesty, they are less likely to rely
on this strategy for self-serving purposes. Thus, with the inuence of social
agents, experience, and exposure, children may learn to tell lies selec-
tively, exibly, and appropriately to maximize the interpersonal benets
to themselves and others, while minimizing the harm. For those children
unable to develop skills for controlling their behavior, or who are living
in environments that reward such behavior, reliance on self-serving lies
may continue in a less nuanced mannerreexively, automatically, and
inappropriately. A child who does not learn the costs of lying (or perhaps
the benets of truth-telling; Wang, Galinsky, & Murnighan, 2009) lacks
social maturity and does not learn socially and developmentally appropri-
ate means of self-regulating behavior, relying on lying as a strategy to
reduce the negative effects of conict with others in his environment
and this behavior may become part of a pattern of maladjustment. An
important goal for the future is to undermine this process, perhaps by
exposing children to rewards for honesty and providing means for them
to access and develop positive self-evaluations for honesty. If accom-
plished, it is possible that childrens chronic lie-telling could be reversed,
as the barriers to honesty are removed.
VI. The Road Map: Future Directions
Despite advances in recent years in our understanding of the emergence

of lying in children, many questions remain unanswered. For example,
although observational data suggest children as young as 2 years of age
make deliberate false statements, it is unclear whether such statements
are a form of word play, wish fulllment, or genuine deception (i.e.,
statements made with intent to instill a false belief into the mind of the
recipient). Another question revolves around whether it is reasonable to
assume that lying is especially suited to serve adaptive functions for chil-
dren because of their lack of physical strength and social power (Bok,
1978). Existing evidence indeed is consistent with this assumption:
childrens lies are generally motivated by self-interest. However, being

adaptive by denition requires one to be exible in ones actions when
facing different situations. In some situations, lying may be called for,
whereas in others, honesty may be a better strategy. No evidence exists
as to whether children are capable of making strategic decisions about
when to lie and when to tell the truth, and whether they are able to make
a costbenet analysis before making such a decision. Further examina-
tion of the motivational and interpersonal contexts of lie-telling is needed.
Few studies have explicitly examined the role of the motivational context
on childrens lie-telling behavior, or the differential consequences of lying
to others with whom they have close interpersonal relationships (e.g.,
parents) versus strangers.
Finally, only a few social and cognitive factors have been examined with
regard to their relation to the development of lying. A host of variables
that are potentially related to childrens lying behavior have yet to be
explored. These variables include childrens general intellectual abilities
which some (e.g., Lewis, 1993) have suggested may be related to young
childrens ability to lie. Another factor is parenting styles and practices,
as some have suggested that a harsh disciplinary style may be related
directly to the development of lying to conceal ones own transgressions
because it is adaptive to resort to lying to avoid severe punishment (Lewis,
1993; Stouthamer-Loeber, 1986). Parenting factors also could be related
indirectly to greater levels of parenting stress and single parent family
structure through less adaptive parenting (Cole & Mitchell, 1998). The
relation between childrens lying and their emotional and personality
factors also warrant examination (e.g., empathy, Machiavellian
tendencies, self-consciousness) but, to date, have not been studied in chil-
dren. Further examination of the roles of environment and cultural con-
texts on childrens lie-telling behavior is needed as well (Fu et al., 2007;
Talwar & Lee, in press). Finally, more work is needed to create the means
to enhance childrens honesty, particularly in moral domains, including
children who have already developed problem lie-telling behaviors.
Future studies that explore these issues should provide a comprehensive
picture of how lying emerges, evolves, and transforms throughout devel-
opment, building the foundation for a comprehensive, transactional model
to both explain and predict the development of deception. Although
further research is needed to fully explain the development of childrens
normative and problematic lie-telling behaviors, it is clear that childrens
lies are kaleidoscopes from which one can glean a multitude of informa-
tion about their moral, cognitive, and social development, and about
which we have a great deal more to learn.
Acknowledgments
This work was supported by two separate grants from the Social
Sciences and Humanities Research Council and the National Science
Foundation BCS-0721536.
REFERENCES
Achenbach, T. M., & Edelbrock, C. S. (1979). The child behavior prole: Boys aged 12 to 16 and
girls aged 6 to 11 and 12 to 16. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 47, 223233.
Achenbach, T. M., & Edelbrock, C. S. (1981). Behavioral problems and competencies
reported by parents of normal and disturbed children aged 4 through 16. Monographs
of the Society for Research in Child Development, 46, 182.
Ahern, E. C., Lyon, T. D., & Quas, J. A. (2011). Young childrens emerging ability to make
false statements. Developmental Psychology, 47, 6166.
Baddeley, A. D. (1986). Working memory. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Bandura, A. (1986). Social foundations of thought and action: A social cognitive theory.
Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Bandura, A. (1991). Social cognitive theory of moral thought and action. In W. M. Kurtines
& J. L. Gewirtz (Eds.), Handbook of moral behavior and development: Vol. 1. Theory
(pp. 45103). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
Baron-Cohen, S. (1992). Out of sight or out of mind? Another look at deception in autism.
Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 33, 11411155.
Bok, S. (1978). Lying: Moral choices in public and private life. New York: Pantheon.
Bottoms, B. L., Goodman, G. S., Schwartz-Kenney, B. M., & Thomas, S. N. (2002). Under-
standing childrens use of secrecy in the context of eyewitness reports. Law and Human
Behavior, 26(3), 285313.
Broomeld, K. A., Robinson, E. J., & Robinson, W. P. (2002). Childrens understanding
about white lies. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 20, 4765.
Burton, R. V. (1963). Generality of honesty reconsidered. Psychological Review, 70, 481499.
Bussey, K. (1992). Lying and truthfulness: Childrens denitions, standards, and evaluative
reactions. Child Development, 63, 129137.
Bussey, K. (1999). Childrens categorization and evaluation of different types of lies and
truths. Child Development, 70, 13381347.
Bussey, K., & Bandura, A. (1999). Social cognitive theory of gender development and differ-
entiation. Psychological Review, 106, 676713.
Bussey, K., Lee, K., & Grimbeek, E. J. (1993). Lies and secrets: Implications for childrens
reporting of sexual abuse. In G. S. Goodman & B. L. Bottoms (Eds.), Child victims, child
witnesses: Understanding and improving testimony (pp. 147168). New York: Guilford
Press.
Byrne, R., & Whiten, A. (1988). Machiavellian intelligence: Social expertise and the evolution
of intellect in moneys, apes, and humans. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Byrne, R. W., & Whiten, A. (1992). Cognitive evolution in primates: Evidence from tactical
deception. Man, 27, 609627.
Carlson, S. M., & Moses, L. J. (2001). Individual differences in inhibitory control and
childrens theory of mind. Child Development, 72, 10321053.
Carlson, S. M., Moses, L. J., & Breton, C. (2002). How specic is the relation between exec-
utive functioning and theory of mind? Contribution of inhibitory control and working
memory. Infant and Child Development, 11, 7392.
Carlson, S. M., Moses, L. J., & Hix, H. R. (1998). The role of inhibitory control in young
childrens difculties with deception and false belief. Child Development, 69, 672691.
Chandler, M., Fritz, A. S., & Hala, S. (1989). Small-scale deceit: Deception as a marker of
two-, three-, and four-year-olds early theories of mind. Child Development, 60,
12631277.
Cialdini, R. B., Baumann, D. J., & Kenrick, D. T. (1981). Insights from sadness: A three-step
model of the development of altruism as hedonism. Developmental Review, 1, 207223.
Clemens, F., Granhag, P. A., Strmwall, L. A., Vrij, A., Landstrm, S., Hjelmster, E. R. A.,
et al. (2010). Skulking around the dinosaur: Eliciting cues to childrens deception via stra-
tegic disclosure of evidence. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 24, 925940.
Coie, J. D., & Jacobs, M. R. (2000). The role of social context in the prevention of conduct
disorder. In W. Craig (Ed.), Childhood social development (pp. 350371). Malden, MA:
Blackwell Publishers.
Cole, K., & Mitchell, P. (1998). Family background in relation to deceptive ability and under-
standing of the mind. Social Development, 7, 181197.
Corriveau, K., & Harris, P. L. (2009). Choosing your informant: Weighing familiarity and
recent accuracy. Developmental Science, 12, 426437.
Coy, E., Speltz, M. L., DeKlyen, M., & Jones, K. (2001). Social-cognitive processes in pre-
school boys with and without oppositional deant disorder. Journal of Abnormal Child
Psychology, 29, 107119.
Darwin, C. (1877). A biographical sketch of an infant. Mind, 2, 285294.
de Waal, F. B. M. (1992). Intentional deception in primates. Evolutionary Anthropology:
Issues, News, and Reviews, 1, 8692.
DePaulo, B. M., & Jordan, A. (1982). Age changes in deceiving and detecting deceit. In R. S.
Feldman (Ed.), Development of non-verbal behavior in children (pp. 151179). New York:
Springer-Verlag.
DePaulo, B. M., Kashy, D. A., Kirkendol, S. E., Wyer, M. M., & Epstein, J. A. (1996). Lying
in everyday life. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 70(5), 979995.
Dishion, T. J., Loeber, R., Stouthamer-Loeber, M., & Patterson, G. R. (1983). Social skills
decits and male adolescent delinquency. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 12, 3755.
Eisenberg, N. (1996). Caught in a narrow Kantian perception of prosocial development:
Reactions to Campbell and Christophers critique of moral development theory. Develop-
mental Review, 16, 4868.
Eisenberg, N., Carlo, G., Murphy, B., & Van Court, P. (1995). Prosocial development in late
adolescence: A longitudinal study. Child Development, 66, 11791197.
Eisenberg, N., & Fabes, R. A. (1998). Prosocial development. In W. Damon (Editor-in-
Chief) & N. Eisenberg (Vol. Ed.), Handbook of child psychology: Vol. 3. Social, emo-
tional, and personality development (pp. 701778). New York: Wiley.
Eisenberg, N., & Murphy, B. (1995). Parenting and childrens moral development. In M. H.
Bornstein (Ed.), Handbook of parenting, Vol. 4: Applied and practical parenting
(pp. 227257). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Evans, A., & Lee, K. (2011). Verbal deceptions from late childhood to middle adolescence
and its relation to executive functioning skills. Developmental Psychology, 49, 3949.
Feldman, R. S., Jenkins, L., & Popoola, O. (1979). Detection of deception in adults and chil-
dren via facial expressions. Child Development, 50, 350355.
Fehrmann, R. S., & White, J. B. (1980). Detecting deception in children. The Journal of Com-
munication, 30, 121128.
Fehrmann, P. G., Keith, T. Z., & Reimers, T. M. (1987). Home inuences on school learning:
Direct and indirect effects of parental involvement in high school grades. Journal of Edu-
cational Research, 80, 330337.
Fontaine, R. G., Burks, V. S., & Dodge, K. A. (2002). Response decision processes and
externalizing behavior problems in adolescents. Development and Psychopathology, 14,
107122.
Froming, W. J., Allen, L., & Jensen, R. (1985). Altruism, role-taking, and self-awareness: The
acquisition of norms governing altruistic behavior. Child Development, 56, 12231228.
Frye, D., & Moore, C. (1991). Childrens theories of mind: Mental states and Social under-
standing. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Fu, G., Evans, A. D., Wang, L., & Lee, K. (2008). Lying in the name of the collective good: A
developmental study. Developmental Science, 11(4), 495503.
Fu, G., Xu, F., Cameron, C., & Lee, K. (2007). Cross-cultural differences in childrens choice,
categorization and evaluation of truth and lies. Developmental Psychology, 43, 278293.
Gervais, J., Tremblay, R. E., Desmarais-Gervais, L., & Vitaro, F. (2000). Childrens persis-
tent lying, gender differences, and disruptive behaviors: A longitudinal perspective. Inter-
national Journal of Behavioral Development, 24, 213221.
Gilovich, T., Savitsky, K., & Medvec, V. H. (1998). The illusion of transparency: Biased
assessments of others ability to read ones emotional states. Journal of Personality and
Social Psychology, 75, 332346.
Gopnik, A. (1993). How we know our minds: The illusion of rst-person knowledge of inten-
tionality. In A. I. Goldman (Ed.), Readings in philosophy and cognitive science
(pp. 315346). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Grice, H. P. (1980). Studies in the way of words. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Hall, G. S. (1891). Childrens lies. Pedagogical Seminary, 1, 211218.
Harris, P. L., & Gross, D. (1988). Childrens understanding of real and apparent emotion. In
J. W. Astington, P. L. Harris & D. R. Olson (Eds.), Developing theories of mind
(pp. 295314). New York: Cambridge University Press.
Hartshorne, H., & May, M. S. (1928). Studies in the nature of character: Vol. 1 Studies in
deceit. New York: Macmillan.
Heyman, G. D., Sweet, M. A., & Lee, K. (2009). Childrens reasoning about lie-telling and
truth-telling in politeness contexts. Social Development, 18, 728746.
Hogrefe, G. J., Wimmer, H., & Perner, J. (1986). Ignorance versus false belief: A develop-
mental lag in attribution of epistemic states. Child Development, 57, 567582.
Jensen, L. A., Arnett, J. J., Feldman, S. S., & Cauffman, E. (2004). The right to do wrong:
Lying to parents among adolescents and emerging adults. Journal of Youth and Adoles-
cence, 33, 101112.
Jolly, A. (1996). Primate communication, lies, and ideas. In A. Lock & C. R. Peters (Eds.),
Handbook of human symbolic evolution (pp. 167177). Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Keltikangas-Jarvinen, L., & Lindeman, M. (1997). Evaluation of theft, lying and ghting in
adolescence. Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 26, 467783.
Koenig, M. A., Clment, F., & Harris, P. L. (2004). Trust in testimony: Childrens use of true
and false statements. Psychological Science, 10, 694698.
Lakoff, R. (1973). The logic of politeness: Or minding your Ps and Qs. In: Papers presented at
the ninth regional meeting of the Chicago Linguistic Society, Chicago: Chicago Linguistics
Society.
Lee, K. (2000). The development of lying: How children do deceptive things with words.
In J. W. Astington (Ed.), Minds in the making (pp. 177196). Oxford: Blackwell.
Lee, K., Cameron, C. A., Xu, F., Fu, G., & Board, J. (1997). Chinese and Canadian childrens
evaluations of lying and truth-telling. Child Development, 64, 924934.
Lee, K., & Ross, H. (1997). The concept of lying in adolescents and young adults: Testing
Sweetsers folkloristic model. Merrill-Palmer Quarterly, 43, 255270.
Lewis, M. (1993). The development of deception. In M. Lewis & C. Saarni (Eds.), Lying and
deception in everyday life (pp. 90105). New York: Guilford Press.
Lewis, M., & Crossman, A. M. (2003, August). Smooth criminals? Detecting childrens lies.
In V. Talwar & T. Lyon (Chairs), Veracity of children: The psychological and legal
implications. Symposium conducted at the American Psychological Association conven-
tion, Toronto, Canada.
Lewis, M., Stanger, C., & Sullivan, M. W. (1989). Deception in 3-year-olds. Developmental
Psychology, 25, 439443.
Lewis, M., Sullivan, M. W., Stanger, C., & Weiss, M. (1989). Self development and self-con-
scious emotions. Child Development, 60, 146156.
Loeber, R., & Dishion, T. J. (1983). Early predictors of male delinquency: A review. Psycho-
logical Bulletin, 95, 6899.
Lyon, T. D. (2000). Child witnesses and the oath: Empirical evidence. Southern California
Law Review, 73, 10171074.
McCarthy, A., & Lee, K. (2009). Childrens knowledge of deceptive gaze cues and its relation
to their actual lying behavior. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 103, 117134.
McCord, W., McCord, J., & Howard, A. (1963). Familial correlates of aggression in nonde-
linquent male children. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 62, 7993.
McFarlane, J. W., Allen, L., & Honzik, M. P. (1962). A developmental study of the behaviour
problems of normal children between twenty-one months and fourteen years. Berkeley,
CA: University of California Press.
Meins, E., Fernyhough, C., Wainwright, R., Das Gupta, M., Fradley, E., & Tuckey, M.
(2002). Maternal mind-mindedness and attachment security as predictors of theory of
mind understanding. Child Development, 73, 17151726.
Mertz Hsieh, D. (2004). False excuses: Honesty, wrongdoing, and moral growth. The Journal
of Value Inquiry, 38, 171185.
Moll, H., & Tomasello, M. (2007). How 14- and 18-month-olds know what others have expe-
rienced. Developmental Psychology, 43(2), 309317.
Newton, P., Reddy, V., & Bull, R. (2000). Childrens everyday deception and performance on
false-belief tasks. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 18, 297317.
Nyberg, D. (1993). The varnished truth: Truth telling and deceiving in ordinary life. Chicago:
Chicago University Press.
Onishi, K. H., & Baillargeon, R. (2005). Do 15-month-old infants understand false beliefs?
Science, 308, 255258.
Ostrov, J. M., Ries, E. E., Stauffacher, K., Godleski, S. A., & Mullins, A. D. (2008). Rela-
tional aggression, physical aggression and deception during early childhood: A multi-
method, multi-informant short-term longitudinal study. Journal of Clinical Child and
Adolescent Psychology, 37, 664675.
Patterson, C. J., Kupersmidt, J. B., & Griesler, P. C. (1990). Childrens perceptions of self and
of relationships with others as a function of sociometric status. Child Development, 61,
13351349.
Pauls, C. A., & Crost, N. W. (2005). Cognitive ability and self-reported efcacy of self-pre-
sentation predict faking on personality measures. Journal of Individual Differences, 26
(4), 194206.
Perner, J. (1991). Understanding the representational mind. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Perner, J., & Wimmer, H. (1985). John thinks that Mary thinks that. . .: Attribution of
second-order beliefs by 5-to 10-year old children. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology,
31, 437471.
Perner, J. (1988). Developing semantics for theories of mind: From propositional attitudes to
mental representation. In J. W. Astington, P. L. Harris, & D. R. Olson (Eds.), Higher-order
beliefs and intentions in children's understanding of social interaction (pp. 271294).
New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.
Perry, L. C., Perry, D. G., & Weiss, R. J. (1986). Age differences in childrens beliefs about
whether altruism makes the actor feel good. Social Cognition, 4(3), 263269.
Peskin, J. (1992). Ruse and representations: On childrens ability to conceal information.
Developmental Psychology, 28, 8489.
Peterson, C. C., Peterson, J. L., & Seeto, D. (1983). Developmental changes in ideas about
lying. Child Development, 54, 15291535.
Piaget, J. (1932/1965). The moral judgment of the child. New York: Free Press.
Pipe, M., & Wilson, J. C. (1994). Cues and secrets: Inuences on childrens event reports.
Developmental Psychology, 30(4), 515525.
Polak, A., & Harris, P. L. (1999). Deception by young children following noncompliance.
Developmental Psychology, 35, 561568.
Popliger, M., Talwar, V., & Crossman, A. (in press) Predictors of childrens prosocial lie-
telling: Motivation, socialization variables, and moral understanding. Journal of Experi-
mental Child Psychology.
Quinn, K. M. (1988). Children and deception. In R. Rogers (Ed.), Clinical assessment of
malingering and deception (pp. 104119). New York: Guilford Press.
Rasmussen, C., Talwar, V., Loomes, C., & Andrews, G. H. (2007). Lie-telling in children with
Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder. Journal of Pediatric Psychology, 33, 220225.
Rogers, R. (1990). Development of a new classifactory model of malingering. The Bulletin of
the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law, 18, 323333.
Rogosch, A., Cicchetti, D., & Aber, L. J. (1995). The role of child maltreatment in early
deviations in cognitive and affective processing abilities and later peer relationship pro-
blems. Development and Psychopathology, 7, 591609.
Rutter, M. (1967). A childrens behavior questionnaire for completion by teachers: Prelimi-
nary ndings. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 8, 111.
Saarni, C., & von Salisch, M. (1993). The socialization of emotional dissemblance. In M. Lewis &
C. Saarni (Eds.), Lying and deception in everyday life (pp. 106125). New York: Guilford Press.
Sabbagh, M. A., Hopkins, S. F. R., Benson, J. E., & Flanagan, J. R. (2010). Conceptual
change and preschoolers theory of mind: Evidence from load-force adaptation. Neural
Networks, 23, 10431050.
Sabbagh, M. A., Xu, F., Carlson, S. M., Moses, L. J., & Lee, K. (2006). The development of
executive functioning and theory of mind: A comparison of Chinese and U.S.
preschoolers. Psychological Science, 17, 7481.
Sameroff, A., & Haith, M. (1996). The ve-to-seven shift. The age of reason and responsibility.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Searcy, W. A., & Nowicki, S. (2005). The evolution of animal communication: Reliability and
deception in signaling systems. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Seiter, J. S., Bruschke, J., & Bai, C. (2002). The acceptability of deception as a function of
perceivers culture, deceivers intention, and deceiver-deceived relationship. Western
Journal of Communication, 66(2), 158180.
Serota, K. B., Levine, T. R., & Boster, F. J. (2010). The prevalence of lying in America:
Three studies of self-reported lies. Human Communication Research, 36, 225.
Shepherd, M., Oppenheim, B., & Mitchell, S. (1971). Childhood behavior and mental health.
London: University of London Press.
Smetana, J. G. (1989). Toddlers social interactions in the context of moral and conventional
transgressions in the home. Developmental Psychology, 25, 499508.
Smetana, J. G. (1999). The role of parents in moral development: A social domain analysis.
Journal of Moral Education, 28, 311321.
Smetana, J. G. (2006). Social-cognitive domain theory: Consistencies and variations in
childrens moral and social judgments. In M. Killen & J. G. Smetana (Eds.), Handbook
of moral development (pp. 119153). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Sodian, B., & Frith, U. (1992). Deception and sabotage in autistic, retarded and normal chil-
dren. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 33, 591605.
Sodian, B., Taylor, C., Harris, P. L., & Perner, J. (1991). Early deception and the childs
theory of mind: False trails and genuine markers. Child Development, 62, 468483.
Stern, C., & Stern, W. (1909). Recollection, testimony and lying in early childhood.
Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
Stouthamer-Loeber, M. (1986). Lying as a problem behavior in children: A review. Clinical
Psychology Review, 6, 267289.
Stouthamer-Loeber, M., & Loeber, R. (1986). Boys who lie. Journal of Abnormal Child Psy-
chology, 14, 551564.
Strichartz, A. F., & Burton, R. V. (1990). Lies and truth: A study of the development of the
concept. Child Development, 61, 211220.
Strmwall, L. A., Granhag, P. A., & Landstrm, S. (2007). Childrens prepared and unpre-
pared lies: Can adults see through their strategies? Applied Cognitive Psychology, 21,
457471.
Sweet, M. A., Heyman, G. D., Fu, G., & Lee, K. (2010). Are there limits to collectivism? Cul-
ture and childrens reasoning about lying to conceal a group transgression. Infant and
Child Development, 19(4), 422442.
Sweetser, E. (1987). The denition of lie. An examination of the folk models underlying a
semantic prototype. In D. Hollard & N. Quinn (Eds.), Cultural models in language and
thought (pp. 4366). New York: Cambridge University Press.
Talwar, V., & Arruda, C. (2011). Factors promoting truth-telling in children: The effect of
expected punishment and appeal to tell the truth. Law and Human Behavior, (under review).
Talwar, V., Gordon, H., & Lee, K. (2007). Lying in the elementary school: Verbal deception
and its relation to second-order belief understanding. Developmental Psychology, 43,
804810.
Talwar, V., & Lee, K. (2002a). Development of lying to conceal a transgression: Childrens
control of expressive behavior during verbal deception. International Journal of Behav-
ioral Development, 26, 436444.
Talwar, V., & Lee, K. (2002b). Emergence of white lie-telling in children between 3 and 7
years of age. Merrill-Palmer Quarterly, 48, 160181.
Talwar, V., & Lee, K. (2007). Socio-cognitive correlates of childrens lie-telling: Conceptual
understanding of lying, executive functioning, and false beliefs. In: Presented at the Society
for Research in Child Development Biennial Meeting, Boston, MA.
Talwar, V., & Lee, K. (2008). Social and cognitive correlates of childrens lying behavior.
Child Development, 79, 866881.
Talwar, V., & Lee, K. (in press). Punitive environment fosters childrens dishonesty: A natu-
ral experiment. Child Development.
Talwar, V., Lee, K., Bala, N., & Lindsay, R. C. L. (2002). Childrens conceptual knowledge of
lie-telling and its relation to their actual behaviors: Implications for court competence
examination. Law and Human Behavior, 26, 395415.
Talwar, V., Lee, K., Bala, N., & Lindsay, R. C. L. (2004). Childrens lie-telling to conceal a
parents transgression: Legal implications. Law and Human Behavior, 28, 411435.
Talwar, V., Murphy, S., & Lee, K. (2007). White lie-telling in children for politeness
purposes. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 31, 111.
Talwar, V., Zwaigenbaum, L., Goulden, K., Manji, S., Loomes, C., & Rasmusen, C. (2010).
Lie-telling behavior in children with autism and its relation to false belief understanding.
Focus on Autism and Other Developmental Disabilities, (under review).
Turiel, E. (1983). The development of social knowledge: Morality and convention. Cambridge,
UK: Cambridge University Press.
Tyler, J. M., Feldman, R. S., & Reichert, A. (2006). The price of deceptive behavior: Dis-
liking and lying to people who lie to us. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 42
(1), 6977.
Vorauer, J. D., & Ross, M. (1999). Self-awareness and feeling transparent: Failing to suppress
ones self. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 35(5), 415440.
Wagland, P., & Bussey, K. (2005). Factors that facilitate and undermine children's beliefs
about truth telling. Law and Human Behavior, 29, 639655.
Wang, C. S., Galinsky, A. D., & Murnighan, J. K. (2009). Bad drives psychological reactions,
but good propels behavior: Responses to honesty and deception. Psychological Science,
20, 634644.
Wellman, H. M. (1990). The childs theory of mind. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: MIT Press.
Wellman, H. M., Cross, D., & Watson, J. (2001). Meta-analysis of theory-of-mind develop-
ment: The truth about false belief. Child Development, 72, 655684.
Welsh, M. C., & Pennington, B. F. (1988). Assessing frontal lobe functioning in children:
Views from developmental psychology. Developmental Neuropsychology, 4, 131149.
Welsh, M. C., Pennington, B. F., & Groisser, D. B. (1991). A normative-developmental study
of executive function: A window on prefrontal function in children. Developmental Neu-
ropsychology, 7, 131149.
Whiten, A., & Byrne, R. (1988). Tactical deception in primates. The Behavioral and Brain
Sciences, 11, 233273.
Wilson, J. M., & Carroll, J. L. (1991). Childrens trustworthiness: Judgements by teachers,
parents, and peers. In K. J. Rotenberg (Ed.), Childrens interpersonal trust: Sensitivity to
lying, deception, and promise violations (pp. 100117). New York: Springer.
Wilson, J. C., & Pipe, M. E. (1989). The effect of cues on young childrens recall of real
events. New Zealand Journal of Psychology, 18, 6570.
Wilson, A. E., Smith, M. D., & Ross, H. S. (2003). The nature and effects of young childrens
lies. Social Development, 12(1), 2140.
Wimmer, H., & Perner, J. (1983). Beliefs about beliefs. Representation and constraining
function of wrong beliefs in young childrens understanding of deception. Cognition, 13,
103128.
Xu, F., Boa, X., Fu, G., Talwar, V., & Lee, K. (2010). Lying and truth-telling in children:
From concept to action. Child Development, 81, 581596.
Xu, F., & Lee, K. (2007). Promoting honesty. In: Presented at the Society for Research in
Child Development Biennial Meeting, Boston, MA.
Zelazo, P. D., Carter, A., Reznick, J. S., & Frye, D. (1997). Early development of executive
function: A problem-solving framework. Review of General Psychology, 1, 129.
Zelazo, P. D., & Muller, U. (2002). Executive function in typical and atypical development.
In U. Goswami (Ed.), Blackwell handbook of childhood cognitive development
(pp. 445470). Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishers.
All in-text references underlined in blue are linked to publications on ResearchGate, letting you access and re

From Little Lies To Filthy Liars - The Evolution of Honesty and Deception in Young Children

Enviado por

Dados do documento

Título original

Direitos autorais

Formatos disponíveis

Compartilhar este documento

Compartilhar ou incorporar documento

Opções de compartilhamento

Você considera este documento útil?

Este conteúdo é inapropriado?

Direitos autorais:

Formatos disponíveis

From Little Lies To Filthy Liars - The Evolution of Honesty and Deception in Young Children

Enviado por

Direitos autorais:

Formatos disponíveis

FROM LITTLE WHITE LIES TO FILTHY LIARS:

THE EVOLUTION OF HONESTY AND DECEPTION

Victoria Talwar* and Angela Crossman{

I. THE PARADOX OF LIES

II. NORMATIVE LIE-TELLING

III. DEVELOPING A CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK OF LYING

IV. LYING AS A PROBLEM BEHAVIOR

V. FROM NORMATIVE TO PROBLEM BEHAVIORAND BACK AGAIN?

VI. THE ROAD MAP: FUTURE DIRECTIONS

Though it is frequently condemned, lie-telling is a common and frequent

as the loss of credibility and damage to relationships. By middle childhood,

I. The Paradox of Lies

how lying develops as a problem behavior in some individuals and to

II. Normative Lie-Telling

Lying has a dual nature in that it is a normative aspect of development

control and meta-representational abilities, and their growing social

A. THE DEVELOPING CONCEPT OF LIES

Early research on childrens lying examined their conceptual and moral

these ndings suggest that childrens understanding of lies evolves

B. THE DEVELOPMENT OF LIE-TELLING BEHAVIOR

In recent years, there also has been increased interest in examining

it seems to peak during adolescence, declining thereafter to a relatively

might call a meta-maxim of General Cooperation (Lakoff, 1973; Sweetser,

speaking, as they require the cognitive perspective-taking skills and empa-

3. SummaryThe Development of Lying

C. COGNITIVE AND SOCIAL FACTORS INFLUENCING THE

To understand the basis for age-related differences in lie-telling behavior,

related to childrens deception (Carlson & Moses, 2001; Carlson, Moses,

4. Socio-Familial, Dispositional, and Cultural Factors

parental warmth and authoritarian parenting may increase honesty

develop a richer understanding of the role of the social environment on

III. Developing a Conceptual Framework of Lying

Despite widespread interest in the conceptual and behavioral develop-

environment. However, parents who are not authoritative do not seem to

inform understanding of the inuence of meta-cognitive factors on

1. SummaryDeveloping a conceptual framework of lying

IV. Lying as a Problem Behavior

Although early lying appears to be related to adaptive cognitive and

environments characterized by harsh and inconsistent discipline, little pos-

V. From Normative to Problem BehaviorAnd Back Again?

Overall, these ndings suggest that lie-telling is initially a normative

and then decrease thereafter due to socialization processes of parents,

It is important to understand how lying is socialized to be exhibited in

VI. The Road Map: Future Directions

Despite advances in recent years in our understanding of the emergence

childrens lies are generally motivated by self-interest. However, being

Você também pode gostar