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Lying in psychiatry: A review

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 August 2021

M.T. Valadas  and
R. Mota Freitas
M.T. Valadas*
Affiliation:
Serviço De Psiquiatria, Unidade Local de Saúde do Baixo Alentejo, Beja, Portugal
R. Mota Freitas
Affiliation:
Departamento De Psiquiatria E Saúde Mental, Hospital do Espírito Santo de Évora, Évora, Portugal
*
*Corresponding author.

Abstract

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Introduction

Lying can be defined as stating a deliberate falsehood with the intent to deceive. It is part of our everyday life but it can be pathological, without motivation and a symptom of psychiatric illness. Although pathological lying has been debated for a century, it remains a controversial issue in Psychiatry.

Objectives

We aim to perform a review regarding pathological lying and related issues.

Methods

We performed an updated review in the PubMed database and GoogleScholar using the terms “pathological lying”, “compulsive lying”, “mythomania” and “pseudologia fantastica”. The included articles were selected by title and abstract. We also consulted reference textbooks.

Results

We described the difference between normal and pathological lying and debated the different types of pathological lying, such as compulsive lying, mythomania and pseudologia fantastica.

Conclusions

Recognizing lying is crucial for a skilled patient interview and distinguishing between pathological and non pathological lying may be decisive for an accurate differential diagnosis.

Keywords

Lying
Type
Abstract
Information
European Psychiatry , Volume 64 , Special Issue S1: Abstracts of the 29th European Congress of Psychiatry , April 2021 , pp. S476
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BY
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the European Psychiatric Association
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