When was the last time you thought someone was lying to you? Was it what they said, how they said it, or something else?
For Michele Rigby Assad, there was a time when determining whether someone was telling the truth meant the difference between life and death.
Assad spent a decade as an undercover CIA officer evaluating sources across the Middle East and an additional 14 years as a corporate and security advisor to companies operating in the Near East.
She says an indicator that someone may be lying isn't always what they say — it's when their behavior changes.
"We tend to see clusters of behavioral indicators that someone is not being forthright," she said.
Assad, who joined the CIA shortly after 9/11 and later specialized in counterterrorism, said she learned early in her career that many sources fabricated or embellished information. Spotting those lies became one of the most important parts of her job, she added.
Her advice isn't to look for a single universal "tell," such as avoiding eye contact or fidgeting.
Instead, she says the key is establishing what someone's normal behavior looks like before asking the difficult questions.
The biggest clue can be a change in behavior
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