Deception in Online Dating
Sara Blair, Marshall Cooper, Shannon Fahnestock
Detecting and Preventing Deception
Since deception is a human behavior there is no sure fire way to prevent deception but research has found some strategies that may help to reduce the likelihood of others lying both online and as well as when it comes to online dating. Research has also found some personality traits and online behaviors that may influence the likelihood of others lying in which online daters may want to be on the lookout for.
The nature of the communication medium of the internet can effect others decisions to lie or not. The first aspect of the internet that may influence lying behavior is if there is a record of the communication itself created. Hancock (2009) found that the more recordable and/or permanent the information provided is, the less likely one would be to lie in that situation. This implies that if a dating website is not able to be edited after one’s initial profile is created or if the messages sent between two interested individuals are stored within the website and can be referenced later, clients of the site maybe more likely to provide truthful information about themselves.
A second feature of the internet that can be related to lying behavior, which was also discussed in the section on why deception occurs in online dating, is whether the interactions take place in real time or not. Lies in conversation are found to often be spontaneous and take place mostly in situations when a truthful response may cause problems. Due to this the time constraints that take place in real time communication can “make it difficult to construct a response that is not an outright falsification of the truth but instead a more subtle distortion of the truth” (Hancock, 2009, p. 117). Internet communication that is not set in real time communication, such as e-mail, may reduce out right deception but may not be positive in the fact it just allows the deception to be crafted more carefully. While real time communication can be helpful in reducing outright deception, the information that comes from this type of communication must still be looked at carefully (Hancock, 2009).
As in many situations, most human behaviors are guided by relevant social norms and expectations. This appears to be the same in online behaviors and that norms can be particularly influential in behaviors in this context. Norms relating deception develop in specific online domains and differ from domain to domain (Hancock, 2009). This data shows that if the social norms show that it is not acceptable to take part in deception on online dating sites, deception would be less likely to occur. In order to put in place these norms online dating sites should have explicit policies that deception is not acceptable and other site members should not tolerate deceptive behaviors.
When it comes to personality traits and online behaviors that may influence the likelihood of others lying research has found some in which online daters may want to be on the lookout for. One of the major personality traits that have been found to be related to online deception is sensation-seeking. People who are high in sensation seeking are significantly more likely to take part in online deception. This is thought to be due to the fact that the internet may be viewed as a high-tech adventure to high sensation-seekers and people with these personality traits may use this domain as a way to deceive in order to meet their psychological needs. Online daters may want to watch for people who appear to be high in sensation-seeking and be on the lookout for possible deception (Lu, 2008).
Online behaviors, such as internet dependency also influence online deception. Research has found that people who are online dependents, or use the internet for large periods of time, are more likely than individuals who do not use the internet as often. Online daters want to be on the lookout for individuals who edit their profile regularly or who tend to be online all the time, and watch the information they provide carefully (Lu, 2008). It is important to remember that the effect of personality traits and online behaviors are a general finding and vary from person to person. Watching for the behaviors mentioned are not necessarily ways to prevent deception from occurring but instead may help one recognize deception and minimize the negative effect it may have on them.
Some additonal sites also address ways to detect and prevent deception. As an example of how deception is used in online dating, Super Awesome Dating is a Blog that discusses how deception is used as a strategy in online dating.
