INTERPERSONAL DECEPTION .3. EFFECTS OF DECEIT ON PERCEIVED COMMUNICATION AND NONVERBAL BEHAVIOR DYNAMICS

Much past research on deception has examined it individually and nonin teractively. Here we argue for broadening our understanding of decepti on by examining it as a dyadic and interactive event. Assumptions of a n interpersonal perspective, articulated in Interpersonal Deception Th eory, are advanced. These include recognizing the agency of both parti es to interpersonal exchanges, examining such exchanges at multiple le vels, incorporating measures of communication-related perceptions and interpretations as well as behaviors, recognizing that behaviors may b e strategic as well as nonstrategic, and viewing such behavior as dyna mic rather than static. An experiment reflecting this orientation is p resented in which pairs of participants, half friends and half strange rs, conducted interviews during which interviewees (EEs) either lied o r told the truth to interviewers (ERs) who were induced to be highly, moderately, or not suspicious. Dependent measures included participant (EE and ER) perceptions, interpretations, and evaluations of EE behav iors and trained coders' ratings of actual nonverbal behaviors. Consis tent with the theory, deceivers were more uncertain and vague, more no nimmediate and reticent, showed more negative affect, displayed more a rousal and noncomposure, and generally made a poorer impression than t ruthtellers. Their behaviors also connoted greater formality and submi ssiveness. Also consistent with the theory's premise that deceptive in teractions are dynamic, deceivers' kinesic relaxation and pleasantness changed over time, in line with a behavior and image management inter pretation, and degree of reciprocity between EE and ER nonverbal behav iors was affected by the presence of deception and suspicion.