Police use 'magic' to read faces of liars

[emad]

The Times
By Thair Shaikh

MI6 agents and police officers are training to become “wizards” in face-reading in the battle against terrorism and serious crime.

The techniques are designed to be more accurate than liedetector tests and to improve success rates in extracting crucial intelligence from uncooperative suspects.

Paul Ekman, the psychologist running the course for the police and MI6, has been called in after taking part in an exercise which showed that expert face-readers can pinpoint lies in seconds. Dr Ekman, Emeritus Professor of Psychology at the University of California Medical School, San Francisco, who has taught the CIA and FBI similar techniques, starts his last week of training today.

He said that the methods would be particularly useful when interviewing people whose first language was not English, because facial expressions were universal. “If I had the opportunity to interview Osama bin Laden, I could find out why he was doing what he was doing. He has his reasons, understanding them doesn’t mean we empathise with him, it means that we have a better chance of predicting his next attack. Facial clues give us information about what the person is really feeling or thinking. Even bin Laden can’t control what his subconscious might betray via his expressions.”
More:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/newspaper/0,,170-1327129,00.html
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Start here boys:

[AndyTiedye]

1. Not As Universal as They Think

> He said that the methods would be particularly useful when
> interviewing people whose first language was not English, because
> facial expressions were universal.

Except when they're not. Autism and some other conditions often
cause facial expressions to have no connection to anything. Some
other cultures have different conventions for things like eye contact.

[realisticphish]

2. of course there are exceptions

but for most people, basic emotions like fear, anger, happiness, etc WERE constant. however, the environment that they show these emotions in DOES vary (i.e., a Japanese person was found in a study to be less likely to show anger around an authority figure than an american)

:hippie: The Incorrigible Democrat