To Lie or Not to Lie? Depends on Whether You Want to Help, or Hurt

We all know lying is bad -- well, except for some people.

But what about white lies?  When your husband asks if his forehead is receding more, or you, how your jeans fit   . . You get the picture. 

But now a new study says that it's never good to lie.

According to newswise.com, if you think you’re helping someone by lying, you may want to think again.

Telling a lie in order to help or protect someone—a practice known as prosocial lying—backfires if the person being lied to perceives the lie as paternalistic, says new research from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.

Chicago Booth Assistant Professor Emma Levine, Deakin University’s Matthew Lupoli, and UCLA Anderson’s Adam Eric Greenberg, find that well-intentioned lies can spark strong resentment from the person who is deceived.

The researchers identify a key factor that determines whether people respond positively or negatively to prosocial lies: the extent to which the lie provides unequivocal benefits for the recipient.

In some instances, people welcome deception, the authors note.

“When the recipient agrees that he or she is better off being lied to, for example, when the lie brings the target a monetary gain, or when the target has already made their desires for deception known to the liar, targets welcome deception. But if there is any question about whether the lie is superior to the truth, people would prefer not to be deceived,” Levine explains.

The authors define paternalistic lies as those that require the liar to make assumptions about whether lying is in the deceived party’s best interest. For example, although most people agree that falsely telling a bride she looks beautiful on her wedding day benefits the bride, there may be considerable disagreement about the benefits of falsely telling a friend she looks beautiful in new clothing she is trying on, when the clothing is in fact unflattering and she would be better off without it. When the communicators choose to lie in this case, they are likely acting on their assumptions about how the person will handle the truth.

The targets of paternalistic lies tend to believe that the liar 1) doesn’t have good intentions, 2) is violating their autonomy, and/or 3) inaccurately predicts their preferences.

“We sometimes tell lies to others believing that they will help, when in reality we are acting upon a paternalistic assumption that lying is better than the truth,” asserts Levine. “Our research demonstrates that in these situations, the individual on the receiving end is likely to resent deception.”

The research team was surprised to find that even when paternalistic liars explain to those they deceived that they meant well, the communication of intention does little to reduce resentment.

For example, in one of the seven studies in the paper, researchers had half of the deceivers explicitly tell the targets that they told the lie because they thought it was best for the recipient. The other half got no so such communication. However, both groups had the same levels of unhappiness with the deceivers, and both groups were just as skeptical of the deceivers, “suggesting that they simply did not believe the word of those who told paternalistic lies,” Levine points out.

So, lie?  Or not to lie?  Obviously, you have to take the situation into account.  Will it hurt the recipient's feelings if you do it to make him feel better?  That's kind of the way I go.  And no, his forehead isn't receding more.