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We've all heard you can spot a liar by their tells: scratching their nose, breaking eye contact, tripping over their words or changing their voice. In theory, we should be able to notice when they're being deceitful because they will start acting abnormally.
But Brennan explains that these tells are mostly "myths". In reality, lying is a "natural ability", she says.
"I think the important thing to remember about The Traitors is that it's a game, so it's not about people necessarily becoming dishonest. They've accepted a temporary role in which deception is permitted, and it's expected, and it's even rewarded.
"It doesn't have the same sort of moral social context that we would have in everyday life. It's like you got a free pass to lie."
Lying is a skill that emerges early, Brennan says, as early as 2 or 3 years of age. Ask any parent, and they will be able to tell you when their toddler first tried to blame a mishap on someone or something else!
"In a sense, a child's first lie is evidence of a really important developmental leap; they can place themselves in other people's thinking", Brennan says.
As we age, she says, we develop greater language, memory and self-control to lie more convincingly, learning as we go the social rules for what kinds of lies are acceptable (white lies to protect someone else's feelings, perhaps), and which are not (lying to get something to evade accountability).
Aside from the everyday small lies, are there people who are better able to lie? Brennan says that "at an individual level there's huge variability".
Liars can come across as more convincing and honest the more rehearsed a lie is, too, she says. It can be influenced by how much practice you've had and how far from the truth the lie is, as a lie grounded in truth is "easier to pull off than a lie that's completely random", Brennan adds.
As for 'tells', Brennan claims these are mostly myths.
"There's no single reliable tell. Liars don't reliably avoid contact; they don't fidget, particularly, or look in a particular direction or touch their face. You might notice a change in voice or expression that may reveal an emotion but not what caused it."
Someone might show a flash of fear or amusement or disgust, but that doesn't reveal whether the accompanying words are false.
Mistaking heightened emotions for guilt is a common mistake on The Traitors, she adds. She points to the Othello Error, which she says happens when you mistake the distress of an innocent person who fears being disbelieved for the distress of a guilty person being caught.
"That's nervousness; it tells us that someone is nervous. It doesn't tell us why."
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