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What Is Statement Analysis
Statement Analysis is the process of examining a person's words to determine exactly what the person is saying. This includes determining if the person is being truthful or deceptive, discovering additional information within the statement, and seeing if the person is withholding any information. Statement Analysis is based on three things:
1. Word Definitions
2. Rules of Grammar
3. Research and Observations
Word Definitions
The majority of the Statement Analysis techniques are based on word definitions. Every word has a meaning. When you combine this with the fact that people mean exactly what they are saying, it then becomes possible to determine what a person is telling you and if the person is being truthful. Look at the following statement which was given during a job interview. Is this person being truthful or deceptive?
In this one sentence, there are three things which tell us what this person is saying.
The subject starts off saying "you know." The subject expects us to take for granted that he is being honest. The problem is he has not told us he is being honest. He did not state "I am being honest." He states "you know" but we do not know. We cannot believe he is being honest unless he tells us he is honest.
The subject goes on to say, "I am trying to be as honest as possible." The word "trying" means attempted, failed, didn't do it. The subject is clearly telling us he is not being honest. He is only attempting to be honest.
He ends his statement by saying "I am trying to be as honest as possible." The words "as possible" mean the subject has a limitation to his honesty. He can be honest up to a certain point. Apparently at this point in the interview he reached his limitation.
When you first glance at this statement, it appears the subject is sincere and being forthright. However, upon close examination of the words he uses we see that he is being deceptive and that he is not very good at it. Even though he wants us to believe he is being truthful, his language clearly tells us he is not being honest.
Rules of Grammar
A portion of the Statement Analysis techniques are based on the rules of grammar. For example, if a person is describing an incident he is required to use past tense language. It does not matter if it occurred 10 minutes ago or 10 years ago, the person must describe the incident speaking in the past tense. Deceptive people who are making up a story will sometimes use present tense language. Consider the following statement.
The subject starts out using past tense language; "I was sitting" "a man walked up." However, the subject then switches to present tense language; "He points a gun at me and tells me to move over." If this was a truthful story, the subject would have said, "He pointed a gun at me and told me to move over."
Another grammar technique has to do with articles. The articles a and an are used to identify someone or something that has not been previously recognized. The article the is used to identify someone or something that has already been recognized. Consider the following statement from an alleged kidnapping:
"A man pointed a gun at me." This is a proper introduction of the man and the gun since the subject allegedly does not know who this person is and has never seen this gun before. However, we have a problem with the last part of the statement "and told me to get in the car." By referring to it as "the car" means the subject recognizes the car or the subject is making up the story which was the case in this situation. If this was a truthful story, the subject would have said, "and told me to get in a car."
Research and Observations
A small portion of the Statement Analysis techniques is based on research and observations. For example, deceptive people will try to convince you they are telling you the truth. Studies have shown that they will sometimes do this by using phrases such as "I swear to God" "I swear on my mother's grave" "Honest to God" "Honestly" as well as several other phrases.
Years ago Al Davis, the owner of the Los Angeles Raiders, was asked if he was going to move his football team back to Oakland, CA. He responded, "I don't know what's going on, so help me God." The very next day he signed the paperwork for the team to move back to Oakland! Al Davis knew what was going on and we know he knew what was going on because of the phrase "so help me God." Just because someone uses the phrase, "I swear to God" does not automatically mean he is lying. It is only an indication of deception and is one more thing within the statement to take a closer look at.
These are just a few examples of the language and sentence structure that you should look for when analyzing a statement. Since the majority of the techniques are based on the word definitions and the rules of grammar, Statement Analysis is a very accurate tool in detecting deception. When analyzing a statement, I do not interpret what someone has said I simply point out what the person has said. My analysis is not my opinion but it is based on the person's own words and the English language. Take a look at my analysis of some famous cases for more examples of the Statement Analysis techniques.
