The overarching aim of this project was to investigate affective components in credibility judgments. The central hypothesis of the project was that perceived credibility reflects a fundamental evaluation (good–bad) of the target person and thus involves affective feelings (positive–negative) and rudimentary behavioral tendencies (approach–avoidance). This hypothesis contrasts with the dominant view in previous research, where credibility judgments have been considered a product of purely cognitive processes. This original aim has been pursued throughout the project, but has also expanded (due to partly unexpected findings) to include the role of feelings in lie detection (i.e., people’s ability to discriminate between true and false statements).

The research in the project has been conducted almost exclusively through experimental studies, where participants have been presented with the task of judging the credibility of targets providing messages primarily via video (and occasionally via text or sound recordings). The experiments have mainly followed the original research plan, but have been complemented with new experiments to follow up on new findings and to investigate their underlying mechanisms.

An important finding from the studies concerns the effect of rudimentary evaluative behavioral tendencies (approach–avoidance) on people’s lie-detection ability. This is a finding that wasn’t predicted a priori and which can be consider a novel development of the original idea. In brief, the studies on this topic have shown that judges in a state related to bodily approach display an inferior ability to discriminate between truthful and deceptive messages, compared with judges in an avoidance-related or neutral body state. This is likely due to the fact that approach states promote a more holistic, less detail-oriented judgment strategy, which has previously been found to hinder successful lie detection.

A second important finding concerns the project’s original main hypothesis regarding the relationship between positive–negative evaluation and perceived credibility. Based on theoretical assumptions and preliminary research findings, it was predicted that placing judges in body states associated with positive and negative evaluation would increase and decrease, respectively, the credibility attributed to the target person. Despite repeated attempts and refined methods, this hypothesis was not confirmed. In contrast, the accumulated evidence supported the absence of such an effect.

A third important finding concerns the role of emotional mimicry in affective influences on credibility judgments. It has previously been established that crime victims tend to be judged as more credible when they display strong negative emotions as opposed to a neutral demeanor (Emotional Victim Effect; EVE). One aim of the project was to examine whether the judge’s mimicry of the victim’s emotional display mediates the EVE. The results did not support this assumption. Instead, however, the deliberate inhibition of emotional mimicry led to increased skepticism and lower perceived credibility. This result is of considerable applied significance, as practitioners in the legal system (e.g.,  prosecutors, court judges) expressly avoid emotional mimicry as a means to remain impartial toward the legal parties.

The project has sparked several new research questions. As mentioned above, a connection between approach–avoidance states and lie detection has been discovered and inspired further studies. This novel line of research ties into basic research on the relationship between approach–avoidance motivation and information processing on the one hand, and the more applied research on human lie-detection strategies on the other. A second novel research question concerns how the presence or absence of emotional mimicry influence credibility judgments. The issue has considerable practical significance and will generate further studies. An additional development relates to the relationship between lie detection and judges’ mental construal of the judgment scenario. This question was initiated by the discovery that “cognitive feelings” (e.g., confidence) that credibility judgments are partly shaped by the compatibility of the judge’s mental construal and the nature of the judgment task.

The project has had significant international involvement as the research has been conducted partly in collaboration with researchers in Germany (Kassel) and Switzerland (Basel). Data collection has been conducted in all three countries.

The results of the project has been disseminated to the scientific community through scientific journal publications and through presentations at international conferences. The process of publishing the project’s findings is ongoing and will continue after the delivery of this final report. At the time of writing, three journal articles reporting results from the project have been published. In addition, two articles are currently under review/revision (and are publically available via PsyArXiv Preprints). Another two article are currently under preparation and will be submitted for publication shortly. All of these have been, or will be, published with Open Access. In addition, one article reporting results partly emanating from this project (synergistically with another project) has been published. All published papers have been made publically available via the Researchgate website. Conference presentations of the project’s results have been delivered at the 16th General Meeting of the European Association of Social Psychology (EASP; Granada, Spain, 2017) and the 27th Conference of the European Association of Psychology and Law (EAPL; Mechelen, Belgium, 2017).

Furthermore, results from the project have been disseminated to relevant professional groups outside the scientific community. This has been accomplished by delivering presentations to practitioners within the legal system (e.g., police, prosecutors, court judges, defense lawyers) at further education courses for the respective groups and at practitioner symposia arranged by the Criminal, Legal and Investigative Psychology (CLIP) research unit at the University of Gothenburg.