Chronic liars don’t simply tell occasional white lies, they make lying a habit. Telling porky pies is second nature to them. As they are accomplished in their art, their dishonesty is more difficult to identify. Occasional fibbers are likely to change the tone of their voice when they lie or hesitate, but chronic liars are smooth operators when it comes to fabrication.
So, how can you identify a chronic liar? The best place to begin is to watch out for revealing body language. When a person lies, they are far more likely to betray themselves via signals their body makes, than via speech alone.
Most liars are very aware of what they are doing. They may not feel that they can help themselves, when lying is an ingrained behavior, and they tend to pick up tips about how to lie effectively, in order to get away with doing so.
What most of them learn first is to give eye contact to the person they are lying to, after all, failure to do so could be a sign of lying, in an occasional liar. Chronic liars make up for this by going too far. Instead of using normal eye contact, they retain a fixed stare. This is unnerving to be on the receiving end of and is a sign of someone attempting to assert control and convince another person that what he or she are saying is true.
As well as using body language, full time liars use simplicity to attempt to get their message across. They cannot tell lies by giving detailed information, because they know if they do, they are likely to slip up and give the game away. Instead, they keep lies short and sweet and try to avoid going into depth about the subject as hand.
If you think you are the victim of a chronic liar you can fight back by playing a psychological game, just as they are with you. When they fix their eyes on yours avoid their gaze. Ignoring their eye contact will make a genuine liar very uncomfortable and may throw them off-guard. Preventing them from attaining eye contact will leave them feeling helpless.
Next, do not let them get away with fobbing you off on the detail front. When you suspect them of lying, ask many, many questions, forcing them to give you detailed information. Afterwards, you will have more fodder available so that you can check out facts behind what they have told you. You may also find they slip up there and then, leaving you to confront them and tell them to mend their scheming ways.
