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1. He Sounds a Little Funny

Liars are sometimes called “fast talkers,” but the speed of their speech varies as much as an honest person’s within a conversation. Yet liars will alter their speech rates within a single sentence. Typically a liar might begin to speak slowly, because he’s trying to figure out his lie-but once it comes into his head, he tries to spit it out as fast as possible.

Pace isn’t the only speech pattern that can trip up a deceiver. Research has shown that a person’s vocal tone will waiver from baseline in up to 95 percent of all deceptive statements. If your partner’s baritone is on the rise, you may be facing a fib.

2. He Slips a Verbal Clue

Remembering the truth about what happened Saturday and the story he wants you to believe is a big mental burden. Many liars will buckle under the strain and make a verbal faux pas, like start-stop sentences (“There are many that I didn’t-I hardly had any contact with her.”), using past and present tenses in the same story or repeating your question rather than answering it.

Even if he doesn’t stumble, his sentences could signal deception: Studies have shown that liars tend to drop pronouns from their speech, as a way to verbally distance themselves from the lie. “I got up this morning, I called my mother, went to work, grabbed a bite with Jim.” The person used two pronouns up front and then dropped them afterward-why? There may be more to his story than he’s letting on.

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