For years, Bella DePaulo (Ph.D., Harvard) asked ordinary people to tell her research team about the most serious lies they had ever told, and about the most serious lies that were ever told to them. One after another, they opened up, describing lies about love and sex, cheating and shoplifting, illness and abuse, kinship and adoption, achievements and resources. They told about lies that resulted in the loss of relationships, reputations, and large sums of money. They even described lies that proved deadly. Some admitted to living a lie. Although there was much pain in their accounts, there were also evidence of some remarkable resilience. There are lessons from these hundreds of stories of major deceptions. Dr. DePaulo shares tips for avoiding the temptation to tell serious lies, and explains why some of the most unlikely people can be vulnerable to getting duped.
I'm Bella DePaulo. I'm a 50-something year old and I have always been single. I love my single life. But I do not love all of the ridiculous assumptions people make about me when they first meet me and learn that I am single. (No, I do not spend my evenings crying in my beer.) I'm also a social scientist (with a PhD in social psychology from Harvard). I write about singles with a passion. My work on this topic (and others) has appeared in publications such as the New York Times, the New Yorker, the Washington Post, Time magazine, and many others. There have been feature stories in Psychology Today and the AARP magazine. I've also been on the Today show and other morning shows, CNN, NPR, and many others. I've written op-eds for publications such as the New York Times, Newsday, the San Francisco Chronicle, Forbes, and the Chronicle of Higher Education. I have been a visiting professor of psychology at UC Santa Barbara since 2000. I think that makes me a permanent visitor. Get in touch if you would like to hire me to speak at your event.
My first book on singles was "Singled Out: How Singles Are Stereotyped, Stigmatized, and Ignored, and Still Live Happily Ever After." My second is a collection of 89 essays, "Single with Attitude: Not Your Typical Take on Health and Happiness, Love and Money, Marriage and Friendship."
I am also an expert on the social psychology of lying. I wrote a short book, "Behind the Door of Deceit: Understanding the Biggest Liars in Our Lives." I also published a collection of professional papers, "The Lies We Tell and the Clues We Miss." You can read more about all of my work on my website, www.BellaDePaulo.com.
