Tuesday, August 07, 2007

Women and the Psychology of the Lie

Recently, 5,000 British women were questioned about their behaviors regarding lying to others. Ninety-six percent of them, or about 4,600 of them, admitted to lying. There were several interesting results that came from the survey, offering some keen insights into the psychology of women and why they lie.

Let’s start with one that is a shocker: Thirty-three percent of women would stay with their husband if they discovered that he was secretly a transvestite. By comparison, seventeen percent would tolerate him if their husbands refused to wash.

What is the reason? I pose that the predominant mentality of those surveyed sought personal harmony through harmony in the environment around them. While it could seem a controversial thesis at first, let’s continue to take a look at some of the other findings starting with the 45 percent of women surveyed that admitted to telling “little white lies” on a daily basis.

A quick web search shows the definition of a “white lie” as one characterized as an “often trivial, diplomatic or well-intentioned untruth.” Going on to say that, “however, the ethical ramifications of being in conflict with an otherwise consistent personal moral theory are far reaching and often involve self-deception. While the white lie is the most common amongst this demographic, 83 percent of women surveyed in The National Scruples and Lies Survey said that they had told a large-scale, life-changing sort of lie at least once; about one in ten women, or 13 percent, admit to doing so on a regular basis.

What sorts of things can a woman say to make her environment a more harmonious place, though? About 1 in 4 women (27 percent) would tell a man if he was “hopeless in bed,” while a bit more than a third (36 percent) would tell their friends about his performance in the sack. More than half, or 54 percent, wouldn’t tell a man he was fat if asked—the remaining 46 percent would tell him the brutal truth. In contrast, they will expect the brutal truth in return: More than 6 in 10 (61 percent) want you to tell them the brutally honest truth, no matter how fat she looks in those pants.

Who is she most apt to be lied to?

Partners (70%) are most likely to be lied to by women, with friends (65%), parents (64%), customers and clients (58%) and bosses (57%) also being deceived.

The top fibs? “No, you don’t look fat,” or lying about shoes.

This only is the tip of the iceberg, though, when it comes to the depth that women will lie to get what they want. If they’re married and have acquired a sexually transmitted disease, 59 percent of women would tell their partners and future partners about it. If they were single, this number nearly flips: Sixty-five percent would not tell partners about it. Once they’re married, about 4 in 10 women—42 percent—would lie about contraception in hopes of getting pregnant, regardless of input from their partner. Once pregnant, if the child was not his and she wanted to stay with him—there is a 1 in 2 chance that she would not tell their significant other.

What these numbers really show is something that psychologists, and anyone with some life experience, has known all along: While men are often competitive and overtly approach things to be overcome, women have a propensity to be more secretive and covert about their competitive nature and wily about accomplishing their personal ambitions. Whereas the classic man is likely to confront someone else, by the time the woman confronts another person, it is often too late.

One could go into an examination of how this has evolved into modern culture from how girls, young ladies, and women were brought up in centuries past, but the cynic in me is likely to boil the matter down to a piece of wisdom from a wonderful poster.

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