How To Identify A Pathological Liar

How to deal with one.

- Shivani Naghnoor

Lying is never a good thing, but we do it at times to save our skins. However there is a term called pathological lying or psuedologia fantastica and this happens when a person lies on purpose making a bigger picture of themselves. Pathological lying is harmful and it can affect a person’s wellbeing, relationship and career.

Anyone would be curious to know about why a person would engage in pathological lying. Experts have not been able to derive any cause that triggers this behaviour.

A pathological liar will lie to appear important or of high esteem, they want to be the hero or centre of attraction or they want sympathy or someone to show them acceptance or appreciation.

Possible reasons that triggers pathological lying

A pathological liar will worry about what society thinks about them, and is likely to have an antisocial personality disorder. The other possible reasons are head injuries or trauma and abnormality in the ratio of the hormone cortisol. Based on a 2016 study, the experiment conducted was what goes on in the brain of a pathological liar. The result showed, the more lies told, the more subjected they are to lying more frequently.

Scientists have observed the brain of a liar is different from that of a non-liar and the proof of it was published in the British journal of Psychiatry. There was a greater amount of white matter in the prefrontal cortex of the brain of a pathological liar.

Scientists concluded that the higher content of white matter could be a trigger point of lying more often.

What is the mindset of a pathological liar? what lies deep within them that can make them want to lie? It can result in trust issues, and for the other person it is a huge shock to withstand. Pathological liars could suffer from narcissistic personality disorders or borderline personality disorder.