You're reading: How to catch a thief, a liar and even a cheating spouse

“I don’t have time to play poker,” says Evgeny Spiritsa, head of the Moscow-based International Academy of Lie Recognition. “But my students are very successful.”

With almost 20 years of experience in lie-detection training and psychological profiling, Spiritsa has worked with security personnel, politicians, business executives and betrayed spouses.

People attend his occasional weekend seminars in Kyiv to learn the craft and use in their business and personal lives.

Basing his work on the research of Dr. Paul Ekman, the prototype for Cal Lightman in the famous television series “Lie to Me,” Spiritsa applies behavior psychology to identify when a person is concealing information.

The basic premise is that the communication structure differs between people concealing the truth or not.

Those who don’t conceal the truth have a regular speaking flow, while those with something to hide stumble on a decision point for the strategy to follow.

That is when an astute observer can pick up on signs indicating deceit.

“The body cannot contradict the mind,” says Spiritsa.

While nose scratching is an easy telltale sign, others are more subtle.

Legs pulled outwards indicate ease, while pulling them back is a sign of stress – as is moving the head slightly back or sideways.

People also employ a number of strategies to get past awkward questions, like challenging the other person’s credentials, questioning the question, feigning amnesia or responding with compliments.

These can, depending on the context, all signal lies.

One way to confirm a lie, according to Spiritsa, is the so-called Colombo method, named after the beloved detective from the eponymous 1980s American detective television series.

In the show, Colombo plays dumb by asking scads of seemingly harmless questions, while occasionally asking about highly specific issues to test a person’s alibi.

The method is fairly simple.

First, ask an easy, positive question to make the person feel comfortable.

Follow up with a neutral one that demands reasoning but holds no emotional baggage.

Then, lead into the test topic, asking about something general.

Finally, ask about some minute detail, the specifics of which were unlikely to be thought up beforehand.

The reaction will tell you everything.

Another way of testing the story is to run through it backwards – a challenging feat if it was made up.

In the TV series, Dr. Lightman watches for expressions that appear on people’s faces while being questioned.

These last only a fraction of a second, meaning the technique requires months if not years of special training for any effectiveness.

Basing his work on the research of Dr. Paul Ekman, the prototype for Cal Lightman in the famous television series “Lie to Me,” Spiritsa applies behavior psychology to identify when a person is concealing information.

Ekman himself looked for “naturals” who would be able to identify lies this way. He found 50 out of 20,000 tested.

Secret Service agents, whose training already hones reflexes, were the only overrepresented group.

Asked about how realistic the “Lie to Me” TVseries is, Spiritsa admits it may be over the top at times but nonetheless remains pretty accurate, especially the third season, which focuses more on the specifics of a profiler’s work.

But the American psychologist’s work is not his only source of material. Indeed, the Soviet KGB also had a specialized unit, called laboratory 30, aimed at developing alternatives to the traditional lie detector.

Asked how they compared to their American counterparts, Spiritsa says they roughly achieved the same results, but that “ours were a little better.” Ekman and his associates, however, were the only ones to turn it into a science and a business.

The secrets of the trade don’t come cheap. A three-hour master class costs Hr 250, while the full weekend seminar will set you back $300.

This doesn’t mean, however, that the audience is only filled exclusively with business executives. “I want to work in human resources,” said Olga Boiko, a student from the Kyiv Polytechnic Institute.
“People are often not ready to answer questions honestly, and conceal something.”

But there is one more reason why people flock to the training sessions, particularly women ages 20 to 55: testing a partner’s fidelity.

Asked who lies better, men or women, Spiritsa said that men definitely have the upper hand, though women are better at identifying lies.

That’s just the way nature developed us, he said.

Fittingly, the base scenario used during the course was that of a husband coming late from a “business meeting” only to be questioned by a suspicious wife.

Together with assisting in a variety of business deals, this makes up a big part of Spiritsa’s work.

It is also the one that backfires most often. According to the lie master, after being interrogated, spouses often retort: “So I haven’t cheated, honey. How about you?”

The Russian expert also trains politicians to appear more honest. He said a Ukrainian politician was seeking out his services ahead of the October elections, but wouldn’t specify whom.

Spiritsa expects to come to Kyiv to hold such seminars on a regular basis. He is also discussing setting up a representative office in Ukraine, possibly in cooperation with the local training institute Powerschool.

He is always looking for volunteers interested in joining his group. The conditions? “Work for me as a slave for nine months,” said Spiritsa.

After that one can try to become a profiler on their own, though mastery takes two to three years.

Skeptics may have their doubts about whether such training will actually help consistently spot people trying to dupe you.

But if a highly trained profiler asked the participants of Spiritsa’s seminars if they believed in the effectiveness of the teachings, no “yes” could be counted as a fib.

According to Spiritsa, “the best way to conceal a lie is to believe it.”

Kyiv Post staff writer Jakub Parusinski can be reached at [email protected].