Abstract
The proposed research considers the ethical decisions and justifications of life actions, which will depend on an experiment between two individuals in a room. The study will be guided by two hypotheses that will guide the participants in making white lies or not. Utilitarianism advocates actions that bring joy, pleasure, and feelings of happiness and opposes behaviors that harm by making white lies.
The study will explore various theories and scholarly works on white lies. It also considers the differences between a white lie and an ordinary lie and the parameters or considerations that should be established to define a lie as a white lie. Moreover, the theory analyses the ethical or moral justifications used by individuals or considered to justify a white lie.
The proposed research also explores the various perspectives used to justify or not justify white lies despite their greater good. Furthermore, it enumerates the significance of white lies from the tellers and receivers of such information. Because the results of such decisions encourage people to be adaptable and thoughtful in their decision-making, the moral responsibility policy also allows people to lie. The justification of white lies depends on the consequences of the individual actions taken or committed by participants. Through the roles assigned to the two gamers, the experiment illustrates a few instances of lying occurring in society. The red card acted as the control experiment to determine the justification of lies, and the green card was the source of conviction for why the men lied.
Problem Background
Every society is built upon fundamental principles that require honesty in dealings and speech. In many cases, people tend to make accurate statements that they can account for if they are confronted in the future. However, there are situations where speakers and writers consider white lies as a pervasive and pragmatic phenomenon utilized to pass certain information to the audience. Those using white lies often use them to achieve their specific goals, which vary according to the receivers of the information and the topic under discussion.
While there are different levels and categories of a white lie, Dhillon and Thomas (2019) indicate that the ethical view of using white lies can be a strategic move for the speaker to reach a desired, yet noble goal. Dhillon and Thomas (2019) reveal that the ethical view of using a white lie can be a competent deception relying on altruistic motivation. In linguistic pragmatics, the concept of the white lie is crucial as it defines how people interact with their surroundings and how they derive meaning from the information available to them.
Humanistic language use requires that it is used appropriately and tactfully to pass the crucial information to the intended audience. Such requires that communication results in a harmonious relationship even in cases where the proportion of the idea is incorrect and unperceivable. The speakers intend to pass a message that the hearers consider helpful, thus making the delivery mode and the deliverer insignificant. According to Singh et al. (2020), the primary principle of any communication where a white lie is involved is to ensure that the information is appropriate to the intended audience and purpose. Consequently, several related theories can help to explain the views provided by pragmatics and white lies.
The proposed study on white lies will apprehend the policy of moral obligation in investigating the influence of white lies. Consequently, it will certify the eligibility of the taxonomy of lies as provided by Erat and Gneezy (2012) or the models of ethical predispositions as presented by Feess et al. (2022) and justify white lies. The study will explore more research on white lies to establish a position on their effectiveness in social life.
Various scholars have proposed ways to research white lies. For instance, Feess et al. (2022) believe it is crucial to develop a behavioral game as an experiment to assist the researchers in recognizing the significance of white lies and how their related payoff decisions affect the ethics of lies. On the other hand, Erat and Gneezy (2012) comprehend the adoption of a deception game to isolate the gender that mainly incorporates white lies to benefit majority groups. While all these approaches can be used to study white lies, the proposed research will consider the gaming approach. Moreover, several theories can be used to explore and explain the ethics of white lies. The proposed study will explore relevant theories, which, together with the proposed experimental design, will help achieve the desired outcome.
Definition of White Lies
Lies constitute information that speakers know is false yet communicate to mislead the addressees. The difference between a white lie and an ordinary one is that the former is meant for the good of the recipient, while the latter is for selfish interest. Nyhan (2020) indicates that speakers may have a lot to hide from the public and may give misleading information to protect specific interests or to postpone the realities of certain circumstances.Thus, the motives and interests of the speakers and the listeners can categorize the type of lie that the speaker can give.
Accordingly, the lies can be grouped as malicious and white lies. As the name suggests, malicious lies are false information perpetrated with the wrong intent to hook the listeners into something that benefits the speakers or their organizations. The audience falls into the trap and realizes later that they have been deceived. On the other hand, white lies are lies told to help the listener overcome a temporary situation.
White lies mainly occur in specific settings and speech situations that are directly linked to a person’s belief, culture, religious background, attitudes and behaviors, and the interlocutors’ intentions. It is intended not to cause harm to the listener, especially when the speaker communicates it for the sake of sounding polite. Chen Marceau (2018) calls it a small lie, that one tells to overcome a possible situation that can harm the listener. The intercalator tries as much as possible not to harm the receiver of the message based on the experience of professional conduct.
For instance, Borris and Zecho (2018) indicate that white lies can be told if the speaker and the listener are in a relationship that they wish to maintain. Several situations that may shake the relationship can be overcome by telling small lies that do not harm the recipient. Moreover, there are situations where the professions may also force a speaker to consider white lies. Professions such as nursing may require critical skills to speak in ways that help to motivate the listener and give them hope, even when there is little for them to hope for based on their circumstances.
Based on the definitions of white lies considered above, the proposed study considers the need to use white lies for altruism and implicature. These two perspectives of white lies are crucial as they give the necessities and implications of white lies. Say et al. (2021) posit that altruism is mainly centered on deceiving other people, and implicature is meant to be understood. Say et al. (2021) reveal that these two views are used mainly to avoid causing harm to the recipients because they hold principles such as harmlessness to the receivers, intentional duplicity, and altruism. Based on these perspectives and principles, white lies are told to protect the listers and recipients of the information shared.
Critical Parameters to Define White Lies
Several parameters can define the acceptable limits of white lies. To understand some of these parameters, the following three areas are considered: police criminal investigation, patient care, and polite white lies to children. These three aspects can give some basis for understanding the necessity of white lies, and the principles can be applied in other areas as well, depending on the situations, the topics covered, and the intended recipients.
Patient Care
Patient care is one of the most devastating circumstances in human history. Sick people look at doctors and nurses as the only people who can help them with their different illnesses. The desperations become more severe when patients are in their final days, and they perceive they could die the next day. For those with a terminal illness, it becomes even more detrimental as the estimated day of death nears.
A study by Cantone et al. (2019) on the caregivers’ experiences of caring for the sick and how they managed the situations revealed that the medics sometimes used the white lie as they were caring for the patients. The study revealed that doctors and nurses are sometimes compelled to consider using a white lie to help them deliver bad news, deal with different cultural settings and patients with diverse cultures, communicate crisis of hope, and sometimes, due to the limited experiences of the nurses and professional incompetence.
A crisis of hope is considered one of the main reasons clinicians use white lies. According to Cantone et al. (2019), nurses may find it hard to disclose some truths to their patients for fear of the outcomes for the receiver of the news. However, Cantone et al. (2019) also revealed that the approach may not always be effective since some patients are more satisfied with the truth of their situations as opposed to the temporary lies.
Another study by Geerse et al. (2019) indicated that it is crucial to avoid discussing issues such as prognosis to reduce the thoughts of death among the patients and to help maintain their hope for recovery. Moreover, Geerse et al. (2019) indicated that delivering bad news to the patients did not have any significant effect on their treatments and beliefs, but the patients were mainly concerned with how they could receive the bad news.
Delivering bad news to patients is the second most considered category for telling white lies when caring for the sick, which depicts why some clinicians use white lies. According to Kawohl and Nordt (2020), various patients react differently to bad news, and the nurses may not predict how a particular patient will receive unwelcome information. For instance, some may become angry, deny, insult the informant, threaten the nurses, or cry.
Kawohl and Nordt (2020) reveal that great communication skills are necessary to help nurses manage these different situations that can result from the patient’s reactions to bad news. According to Sarradon-Eck et al. (2019), caregivers may be reluctant to give bad news or cannot pass such information to the recipients. The delivery of bad news may also be affected by the nurses’ negative attitudes, information delivery time, lack of accurate information regarding the issues, and inappropriate answers given to patients when they question the information.
Culture is also critical in the patient care systems and affects the delivery of information, compelling nurses and doctors to use white lies. From the healthcare perspective, culture can be considered based on caregiving, medical, personal, and organizational aspects. According to Schmidt et al. (2019), white lies can be used in clinical settings to help achieve the clinicians’ therapeutic objectives in cases where culture can hinder such outcomes. Such small lies help to protect the lives of the patients in cases where a direct negative answer can be detrimental. Schmidt et al. (2019) reveal that caregivers experience difficulties in truth-telling due to diverse cultural limitations, especially when the patients are in critical situations. Consequently, the deliverer of a message to a diverse patient culture must have advanced communication techniques to integrate white lies as they help the patients live with their medical situations.
Police Criminal Investigation
White lies can also be used during criminal investigations by police officers. According to Lander et al. (2018), the policing system is created to find the best ways for communities to exist peacefully and make the government run its programs effectively. For instance, in situations where the police realize there is a security problem within an area, the service can create a deception to help mitigate the impending threat that can be caused by the issue.
Lander et al. (2018) indicate that it is common for the police to also deceive communities regarding an existing issue as they investigate it. It is in the interest of the police that a piece of information should remain unknown to the public until the service is sure that the danger has been eliminated. This is done to protect the lives of the community, speed up the investigation, and achieve its intended outcomes.
The police may also use false information when cross-examining prosecution witnesses and perpetrators. They may do this through hidden identities, where they would speak and live in disguise to collect crucial insights from the public. For instance, a police officer can be an undercover cop working with criminals to get to the top of the command chain, thereby helping with the core investigation of the suspects.
Moreover, they can also deceive by omission as they seek to get to the root of the matter they are investigating. Lander et al. (2018) indicate that this hidden identity is crucial to the achievement of the goals of the investigation, which may be done for the public interest. Lander et al. (2018) further revealed that it is okay for officers to use harmless means to gather information that helps in addressing the safety of the public. Consequently, it is acceptable to use white lies among the police force as this can result in the stability and security of the public.
Polite White Lies to Children
Children can show different forms of white lies depending on various circumstances using multiple display roles such as verbal and nonverbal. According to Lee and Imuta (2021), children use verbal communication to tell politely white lies. The manner and extent of the skills may depend on several factors, including exposure and training. Kids can lie because they have been trained to say something in each situation, or they have been told to act in certain ways.
Moreover, they can also lie because they want to see the outcomes of their lies (Lee & Imuta, 2021). Thus, socialization agent plays a crucial role in the teens becoming white liars, which they can further develop as they become older. Heyman et al. (2020) indicated that children tell more white lies as they grow and some experts in deception. The older children can tell a white lie and try to defend it using different arguments. On the contrary, younger children are most likely to say the truth if they are confronted with more questions.
The Ethical Considerations for White Lies
The relativism of truth and lies depicts that there is no balance in the moral perspective of lies. Morality has been mainly considered a religious viewpoint of various issues in the world. Since there are many different religions with different views about life and existence, then there is no absolute morality of truth and lies. Consequently, white lies can be considered an amoral attribute, whose morality depends on the worldwide of different religions. According to Forsyth (2020), it is fair that if religions do not agree on a common idea, then they cannot agree on the morality of white lies.
For instance, the deontological view provides that there is a moral law that defines morality. In this case, the moral law asserts that something right is morally acceptable, but a wrong one is morally unacceptable. Consequently, there can never be a good form of lying, even if such lies are meant to save lives. Immanuel Kant revealed that lying was wrong from a moral viewpoint (Martín et al., 2021). However, Kant does not mention the morality of white lies specifically because of the diverse forms and levels of falsehood. He noted that everyone is born with human dignity, which is an intrinsic value precious to each person.
On the contrary, there is the ethical perspective of white lies due to their impact on the recipients. According to Conlin and Boness (2019), ethical concern is an event, circumstance, or concept based on the effects it has on others. As noted earlier in the definition of white lies, they are meant to not cause harm to the receivers. Based on the intentions of white lies, it is possible to consider the flip side of the intended outcome.
For instance, an ethical issue would arise in events where a moral lie is told, which would result in a detrimental outcome. Kent reveals that while each one has dignity, the power to make free choices is human, and respecting that power of choice is ethical (Conlin & Boness, 2019). Thus, the ethical perspective of white lies can be assessed based on the weighed options and the choices made by an individual to deceive others.
Based on the perspective that ethical consideration of white lies is a quality of respecting the humanity of a person, then to determine if the white lie is ethical or not, it is crucial to determine what drives people to tell white lies. Telling white lies corrupts the fabric of human beings, which is the power to make free rational decisions. It also robs the recipients of the power to choose what they want in their lives or experience the other side that has been hidden from them due to deception.
O’Neill (2019) reveals that everyone has an influence, which can be used for good or bad, depending on the decision the person makes. Thus, in cases where the white lie told by an individual can lead others astray, it may be considered unethical. Still, this may not be unethical since being led astray is also a personal choice that others make. Hence, such lies may become unethical if there is no choice for the recipients.
Virtue ethics also define lying as a morally wrong attribute. For instance, virtue ethicists do not rightly judge if a person is rightor not based on their behavior.Rather, they consider the development of a person and their surroundings, thus understanding the qualities that define such individuals. Virtues are considered the elements that guide the conduct of each person and their relationship with others in society. Consequently, from a virtue ethicist’s perspective, a white lie can be ethical when told by someone whose intentions are pure, and it can be unethical when told by one whose intentions are questionable. This perspective lifts the ethical burden from the lie itself and places it on the teller, which, therefore, requires the listeners to consider the possible intentions of the speaker.
The idea of a white lie in pursuit of virtue then comes into conflict. One may consider white lies to achieve a certain virtue they desire, such as taking alcohol to enable them to become more compassionate. According to Conlin and Boness (2019), the conflict between virtue and lie is addressed through the unity of virtues, which is a doctrine dictating that a virtuous person will most likely have all virtues. For instance, a caring lie would be offered when one considers the impacts of the care on the person receiving it. Consequently, unlike Kent’s position, virtue ethics argue that lying can be ethical when it makes the white liar more virtuous.
Utilitarian ethics considers the balance of a lie based on whether it is beneficial or harmful. According to Slee and Tait (2022), utilitarians argue that any action, including white lies or other lies, is morally acceptable if their outcomes result in more benefits or significantly reduce harm to the intended recipients. Based on this perspective, a white lie can only be moral when it results in better outcomes, but it is immoral if it maximizes adversities. The utilitarian view also depicts the need to weigh the consequences before telling the white lie. The ethical dilemma resulting from such a lie must be solved in the best way possible that will result in minimum undesirable consequences.
Nobel lies, also referred to as altruistic lies, are mainly intended to help the receiver overcome a temporary issue. For instance, a doctor may tell a patient that they have a survival probability of 50 percent when, from the confirmation of tests, the doctor knows the patient has three months to live. Utilitarians consider such a lie to be a moral one because it does not harm the patient but increases hope for the patient to get better and eventually heal. Telling such a patient that they have only a few days to live would be more detrimental to their health, and they may die sooner due to depression. Therefore, the altruistic lie can serve as a moral quality, and its utility becomes an event for the recipient.
The critics of utilitarians also reason logically that there is an impractical application of the claim. According to Mejia et al. (2018), it is common for people to underestimate the impact of their lies poorly, or they may undervalue the harmful consequences of their actions. For instance, when a person realizes they were deceived, they begin to develop trust issues, become more private, and increasingly become more depressed. This affects their quality of life, which continuously becomes poorer. Moreover, Mejia et al. (2018) indicate that using white lies for the greater good may result in situations where there is no specific distinction between moral justifications and excuses for selfish gains. This may lead to moral bankruptcy, where the continuously white liar can still claim to donate to charity.
Moreover, scholars criticizing utilitarian justifications also posit that there is no specific way for any person to know how their white lies contributed to the good that would result if they told the truth. According to Mejia et al. (2018), white lies told do not have any measurements of outcomes for the recipients. On the contrary, it is easier to know the positive or negative outcomes of the truths told.
Moreover, Mejia et al. (2018) reveal that since white lies are intended for the greater good, their effects often go unnoticed as there are no ways to measure their outcomes. In some instances, these white lies can fail to produce their intended results, thus leading to more adverse effects. For example, a child who trusts a parent who uses white lies can become a liar themselves. Furthermore, as children grow up, they may become more cynical and untrustworthy, thus being more deprived of the ethical virtues they would have had their parents tell them the truth. Consequently, white lies are morally wrong since the tellers cannot account for the benefits and harm the deceptions cause in real time.
Based on the arguments presented on the ethical considerations and morality of white lies, it is crucial to examine them. Several outcomes are currently associated with white lies because some things have become common to societies, making it difficult for one to distinguish what is right and wrong. Social uncertainties exist due to the mixtures of utilitarian, virtuist, and Kantian views, which affect how people perceive a white lie as moral and ethical, as well as the issues of the irregularities in measuring the outcomes of the lies told.
However, these positions mainly consider wider perspectives, which do not address the vast array of human motivations and conduct. People are born into and interact with a complex world, which defines their lives in different ways. Most importantly, regardless of what defines the person, the decision is made at an individual point. This implies that, due to the different perspectives of scholars, there is no agreed position on whether the white lie is ethical or moral; rather, it lies on the person, based on the assessment of potential outcomes or personal character.
Justifications for White Lies
White lies have been discussed for ages on whether it is acceptable or not. The discussions on the morality and ethical attributes attuned to white lies have also widened the scope of justifying white lies. Being a non-absolute attribute, a white lie can be justified from a specific point of view, which does not globally apply. The virtuists, utilitarians, Kantians, Deontologists, and many other categories of philosophers have different perspectives of looking at white lies, hence can justify it or not depending on their worldviews.
Virtue Ethics
The virtuists mainly derived their beliefs from the Aristotelian view of character and virtue. They believe that one’s conduct determines one’s state of being; thus, acting well results in better outcomes for the individual. According to Small and Lew (2021), virtue is an intrinsic element derived from the inner state of the person. Virtuists would justify white morality if it comes from a person with pure intentions.
For example, a kind person would be justified to use a white lie because they intend to share their kindness with the recipient of the information. For example, a person may tell a lie to a thief who wants to rob a certain family by directing them to a different location. In this case, awhite lie would be justified because the liar tries to be kind to the person who would have been robbed. In another instance, a virtuist nurse may tell a patient that they are getting better to see the patient smile and keep them motivated. Such spread of inner views is intended to produce positive effects for the receivers.
On the contrary, virtuists may consider white lies unjustified if the producer is known to have issues with their character. These would be scenarios where the person has been associated with killings. For, a person may not tell a white lie to save lives or protect the people they love.
For instance, Small and Lew (2021) indicate that one’s character states are fixed and stable dispositions of who they are, which is why their actions are equally predictable. One would keep acting as one has been in the past, including using deception to gain an advantage over one’s current situation. However, virtual ethics views may limit the application of white lies because there is potential for change and some form of compassion even among those considered to have no virtue.
Utilitarianism
The utilitarians’ views consider everything based on their potential outcomes, either good or bad. A utilitarian would look at the attribute and consider its outcome when applied in the context. For example, a white lie would be justified if it creates value for the recipients as opposed to causing harm.
According to Casey et al. (2020), utilitarians may consider white lie appropriate if it will result in the greater good and limit the potential of adverse outcomes. A white lie would be ideal in scenarios where it would save lives that would otherwise be lost if the truth is told. For example, from a consequentialist perspective, a doctor should use white lies when giving their patients bad news regarding their health. Such scenarios would be where the patients are diagnosed with terminal illnesses and have a predicted time to live. Using a lie to cushion reality may help reduce death anxiety while increasing hope of living.
On the other hand, utilitarianism may consider white lies unjustified if the outcome has fewer positive outcomes concerning its negative consequences. For instance, in the case of an outbreak of a disease, the government may consider it good to keep the information from the public as it tries to contain the medical issue identified in each location. The government may have good intentions of doing that, for example, to prevent panic and unnecessary movements that can result in perceived harm. However, if the disease spreads and harms more people, then the white lie does not meet its purpose. Consequently, the utilitarian point of view would anchor on the benefits derived from the lie versus the demerits and decide based on which one has more weight regarding benefits.
Kantian Ethics
Similarly, the Kantians would use social laws to justify white lies or not. The Kantians hold that moral decision-making in speech is attached to one’s choice to deceive or tell the truth. The choice made by an individual comes from their interaction with their people or environment.
According to Ward (2019), Kant believes that when one has good intentions, their activity cannot justify lying. Thus, it is not permissible for Kant to tell any form of a lie because it would cloud the purpose of the communication. They would first consider themselves the recipients of the information they are about to share, and if it were a lie, they would desist from it. This further indicates that there is no way for Kant to justify a white lie even if it results in good.
Deontology
In the eyes of the Deontologists, a white lie may not be justified because of the conflicts with the moral law. The moral law states what is good is moral, while what is bad is immoral. Based on these views, lying is considered a bad attribute, which, even though framed as a white lie, remains on the negative side of the moral balance. Deontologists will consider an act of kindness shown towards another person through a white lie deception would be going against the moral law.
For instance, lying to a terrorist who wanted to attack a certain area would be considered immoral, not because of the outcome or intention of the lie, but for its definition of moral references. This view may be detrimental to society as it would mean a lack of caring for each other. In such cases where the moral law is strict and does not address the plight of the society, it becomes a burden intended to benefit no human beings.
Based on these assertions and arguments regarding the justification of white lies, no view can be used to admit a specific lie. The justification for the lie becomes an ethical dilemma that one must address based on the impending issue. According to Townley (2019), humans are given the power to reason individually without relying on the guidelines of any power. With this innate wisdom, one can decide to do anything they wish if it is in their best interest or conviction that it would please them.
Whether the decisions are in line with morality, utility gained, or character developed over time, the individual knows how they feel from their action. Everyone is created to develop from the lowest level of moral development, which is mostly attuned to the “me” factor. Based on the different interactions and life experiences, including philosophy and religion, one grows from me to mine to ours, and the community (Townley, 2019). This is a significant attribute of human beings, which defines the innate power to make decisions when one is alone and does not act based on the acquired external limitations and definitions of the actions one should take in any given circumstance.
Significance of White Lie
The literature reviewed indicates that white lies are mainly used to benefit the recipient. The speaker or the originator of the lie has the pure purpose of ensuring that the person is not harmed in any way. As noted earlier, these effects include the desire to protect relationships, keep hopes alive, and protect the reputation of another person.
On the contrary, the studies explored have also revealed that white lies have negative outcomes, depending on their unexpected results. Therefore, it is important to investigate whether a white lie is a deception when the goal is to have a good effect and to identify some of the moral boundaries that people must cope with when they are told a white lie. It is also crucial to examine how individuals will react if there are no negative results or negative impacts on their actions through white lies.
As noted from the literature explored, a white lie is a type of lying that is considered a soft landing for a person who may otherwise be harmed if they are told the truth. In most cases, white lies are not provided by anyone and are for any specific reason. They are personal responses given to different situations that one finds themselves in and would wish to cause the least harm possible.
As defined by Kant, lying is a morally wrong attribute because it goes against the standards of morality defined by various religious and societal norms. Thus, white lies are a category of lies detested by different moralists. Still, no scholar or philosopher defines a white lie as a moral attribute. However, a white lie is considered an ethical issue that one can pursue based on the outcomes to the recipient. Thus, if a white lie is told positively, then it can be considered a good course to take to achieve the intended purpose. The ethical dilemma resulting from white lies may have significant burdens on both the speaker and the receiver depending on several factors that come after the delivery of such lies.
One of the critical issues affecting the morality of white lies is that it is not easy to determine the limitations individuals face when confronted with a white lie. For instance, when one tells a white lie, they do not know the immediate consequence of their action. They hope that the lie will achieve its intended purpose. With a lack of specific measurement approaches, the tellers of white lies are left to guess that their lies have yielded the desired results.
Moreover, some circumstances also lead to white lies being the cause of some undesired attributes among the receivers of the lies. For example, consistent white lies to children may make them become seasonal liars or develop attitudes that make them more private and discrete about their lives. This moral issue makes white lies unnecessary in cases where such events may be overcome. In addition, white lie also presents the ethical dilemma where individuals become increasingly attuned to lies that even black lies become normal. For instance, one may lie about an issue and deceive themselves with a consolation that one would do good in return.
The proposed research is expected to have a significant effect on the people who tell white lies. It is expected that since white lies are considered to mainly benefit the receivers, the speakers will be happier with the outcomes of their actions. In most cases, everyone lies depending on several factors and personal attributes. The motives of lies mainly differ from one person to another, which further defines the diverse differences in white lies being told across different places and situations.
As noted earlier, deceptions are meant to hide some hurting truths from the public, to help a few people, or not cause panic on a wide scale. While the study will not consider how governments feel about the white lies they tell, it will apply a general feeling of the outcomes received from the white falsehood shared. Expert liars weave their life with threads of truth, while poor liars are evasive. In order to analyze the responses of those who support or criticize white lies, prolific liars will rely on their oratory abilities.
The study will also be crucial in its theoretical significance because it focuses on different theories and scholarly views regarding different concepts of a white lie. For instance, the idea of telling a white lie from an innocent perspective indicates that people are likely to peddle white lies as an indication of their lack of knowledge of the issues they are sharing or their deep beliefs on the same. This is crucial from different perspectives since it makes it easier for the study to understand white lies as shared by kids and adults.
Moreover, the proposed study also considers the development of pragmatics and the use of linguistics in communication and how these concepts help in the effectiveness of white lies. This area is crucial since the proposed research assumes that there are situations where white lies are necessary. Hence, there is a need to provide insights that can help communicators develop critical skills that can help them become good communicators in their relevant fields. Consequently, the study will contribute more to the scholarly work on white lies.
Hypothesis 1: If the outcomes of the card selection would result in criticism, then both individuals in the room would lie on the card they picked.
Hypothesis 2: If the outcomes of card picking do not determine the price tag issued to the winner of the green card, then both parties would tell the truth.
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