Cross-cultural Differences in Beliefs About Lie Detection: A Comparison of Arab and Non-Arab Australians (Walaa Katta honour's thesis)

Walaa Katta's honours thesis. This study utilised an open-ended question and a 10-item questionnaire created by the Global Deception Research Team (2006) to explore potential lie detection method differences between a sample of Arab- (n = 102) and non-Arab-Australians (n = 70). The results showed that while most participants in both groups were confident in their ability to detect deceit, Arab-Australians thought they could detect lies significantly more than non-Arab Australians. Both Arab- and non-Arab participants tended to rely on non-verbal behaviour to detect lies; however, there were some differences, some of which were surprising given purported cultural differences with some non-verbal behaviours.