In his seminal book on lying and its detection, Telling Lies (1985), psychologist Paul Ekman of the University of California provides useful definitions for aspects of the interpretation of truth and untruth.
| Leakage | When a liar inadvertently reveals the truth. |
| Deception Clue | When a liar suggests he is lying without revealing the truth. |
| Brokaw Hazard | Misjudging a truthful person who happens to be naturally convoluted in speech. (Named for NBC journalist Tom Brokaw, who believed he could detect lies verbally from an interviewee’s circumlocution.) |
| Othello Error | Misjudging a truthful person by failing to take into account the stress of being disbelieved. (Inspired by the climactic scene in Shakespeare’s tragedy where the Moor misinterprets Desdemona’s distress as guilt.) |
| Trojan Horse Strategy | Where the interlocutor pretends to believe the respondent in the hope the respondent will become entangled in his own fabrications. |