(1) In a large study we ran, IQ (measured by performance on intelligence tasks) had a strong correlation with self-reported (remembered) performance on the math portion of the SAT exam (r=0.61, n=714), which most participants would have taken MANY YEARS prior. This suggests that they were neither lying that often nor were their memories (of a long-ago event) that bad. Though I think there was likely some inflation in their self-reported scores, their reported scores contained a lot of signals.

(2) When we asked people how much they agreed with the extremely subjective statement “I feel satisfied with my income” (on a 7-point scale), their responses correlated quite strongly with their self-reported household income (r=0.43, n=639). This suggests that self-reported subjective feelings can map pretty well onto actual realities.

(3) When we asked, “Have you ever been diagnosed with depression by a medical or mental health professional?” it had a reasonable correlation with the level of agreement to the single statement, “I often tell myself that ‘I am not good enough’ (r=0.37, n=509). This suggests that agreement with vague, seeming statements can say a surprisingly large amount about a person.

(4) You might think that even if it’s an anonymous survey, people wouldn’t be willing to admit socially undesirable behaviors or traits, socially stigmatized events, or highly personal things. But, in our experience, many people are willing to indicate that these apply to them. In one study, when asked if they had ever cheated on a romantic partner, we found that 32% of respondents admitted to having done so.  In another, when asked whether, in childhood, an adult in their home ever hit, beat, kicked, or physically hurt them, 26% agreed. When asked if they had been raped, more than 20% agreed. While it’s certain that some people lie, many people are willing to honestly talk about their experiences in anonymous surveys.

While it’s important to be cautious about self-reporting on surveys – people can lie, they may not be paying attention, they may not remember, and they may lack self-insight – in my experience, it often works (perhaps surprisingly) well to tap important traits!

This piece was first written on March 29, 2025, and first appeared on my website on April 24, 2025.

1) Narcissistic deceivers: they don’t track or even consider whether what they are saying is true; they say what feels good to them. This relates to what philosophers call “bullshitting” (as opposed to “lying”).

Some well-known politicians fall into this camp.

2) Psychopathic deceivers: they know they are saying false things but don’t care and are just saying whatever best serves their own agenda. They don’t experience guilt about lying.

Some popular media personalities fall into this camp.

3) Motivated deceivers: they know they are lying and feel bad about it (when they think about it), but they think it’s worth lying because the cause is too important or there is too much to be lost if they don’t lie, or there’s something important to them to gain by lying.

Some leaders of organizations fall into this camp.

4) Delusional deceivers: they have lost touch with reality, usually due to mental health problems (such as psychosis) or extremely heavy drug use. They are often paranoid.

Some famous authors fall into this camp.

5) Believing deceivers: they’ve been convinced of false information through propaganda, idealism, cognitive dissonance, trusting unreliable sources, or social forces/pressures and genuinely believe it’s the truth. They aren’t delusional or evil, just (potentially very) misled.

Many people on all political sides are like this. This is, in my view, by far the most common reason individuals spread misinformation, though it may not be the most common reason that public figures spread misinformation.

Whether you are working to combat misinformation or just trying to understand it, it’s useful to know what you’re dealing with. Spreaders of misinformation come in very different forms and have very different reasons for doing so.

This piece was first written on March 22, 2025, and first appeared on my website on April 22, 2025.