What forensic psychology and evolutionary biology tells us how to win The Traitors

Claudia Winkleman, host at The Traitors

BBC / Studio Lambert

Hoods up, torches lit, knives sanded: viewers all over the UK are ready for another delicious final of The traitors This evening, the TV gaming show, where participants try to reveal the ruthless (not strictly real) murderers walking among them.

For psychologists – both professionals and armchairs – The traitors is a gold mine of insidious human behavior to disassemble and analyze. And it’s not just psychology. Game theory, human evolution and criminology are just some of the scientific fields that give clue to the show’s machiavellian dynamics.

We examined experts in treason (academically …) to find out what really needs to win The traitors. WARNING: Spoilers ahead if you are not up to date with the show.

Take care of the conformity bias

“Having a strong characteristic seems to be something that other people notice as being influential and potentially threatening,” says forensic cleah Wright, who hosts a podcast about The traitors With colleagues from the University of Chester, UK. She highlights participants like Yin (too intelligent), the elen (too emotional) and Armani (too confident).

Their underflows have probably been associated with conformity bias, the trait of people that causes most of us to adhere to social norms. Persons not in accordance with them do not like or have mistrust.

This is not the place of altruism

Emily Emmott, an evolutionary anthropologist at University College London, says players must keep in mind that “in evolutionary literature does not exist right.”

“Remember, it’s not a collaboration game,” she says. “It’s a game of disappointment, a survival game. You have to be there in the end to win. It’s a mistake some players make because they rely too much on the people they’re close to.”

Emmott says we evolved to help ourselves in front of others, so that any altruistic behavior looked at the show has a selfish advantage behind him. And such apparently altruism is not a bad tactic, whether you are a faithful or a traitor.

“In the gaming context it serves to be cooperative as a signal of credibility. A good example may be obvious not to go after the shield [which protects you from the next murder] during the tasks of the show. ”

But here Machiavelli intelligence comes in – because everyone knows the rules of the game, a good player will not take altruistic behavior at face value. “In this game, it’s not an honest signal because there may be back thoughts for you to work together,” says Emmott.

So watch out for the cute guys. An analysis of thousands of messages between players in Diplomacya game that shares similarities with The traitorsFound out that players who were excessively polite were more likely to betray others.

Take care of prejudice in the group

“We know from social psychology that when people form social groups, they have what is called an in-group bias and it can really be accelerated in The traitors“, says Wright.”[Contestants] exhibit preference behavior towards people who are in that group with them. ”That’s why it all went wrong for Minah after recruiting Charlotte as a traitor.

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Charlotte is being recruited as a traitor of Minah

BBC / Studio Lambert

For Minah, who always sought female traitors, her group was the so -called sisterhood she created. “She identified it a lot as a sisterhood, she used the word a lot,” says Wright. “The problem was that Charlotte already had a strong group identity with the believers. So when she was recruited, a little against her will, she had no allegiance to the new group. “

And what happened? Charlotte doubled Minah immediately and Minah was voted out the next night.

Wright says that the same partiality in the group can lead to a herd mentality when players vote, and an illogical confidence in people in the game.

What makes a good liar?

Nervous or incoherent answers to questions are generally considered with suspicion, even if someone speaks true. That’s because that behavior is tied to stereotypes about what people think liars do. A better giveaway is people who always say the same thing, says Emma Barrett, psychologist and criminologist at the University of Manchester, UK.

“One thing to be aware of is one that always tells the same story in exactly the same way and doesn’t really elaborate when they retell it,” she says. A story may sound plausible, but when we repeat it, we usually add details as we remember them. “People sometimes confuse consistency with honesty. But that’s how recall does not work in real memories.”

Think like a scientist

“A brand of a good detective is a high tolerance to ambiguity. They don’t come quickly to a conclusion,” says Barrett. It’s like thinking like a scientist: “You might have a plausible hypothesis about something. Then you will ask yourself about the assumptions you make and the gaps in your understanding. You must actively look for evidence that disproves the hypothesis you generate. ”

New scientist. Science news and long readings from expert journalists covering developments in science, technology, health and environment on the website and magazine.

In search of traitors – in the early days of The Traitors’ Third Season

BBC / Studio Lambert

Believers are not very good at that The traitorsBut another tactic they could use is to encourage a suspected traitor to speak more than they would like. It’s about giving them enough ropes to hang in, says Barrett.

“If you are a faithful, a good strategy to discover a traitor to subtly encourage them to speak,” she says. “If, for example, you were a police officer and you would know if someone had given you a fake address is a question you could ask, ‘Oh, how are you getting there, what’s your nearest station?’

If in doubt, try game theory?

An uninformed majority will always lose to a fully informed minority. It was on this basis that Russian psychologist Dimitry Davidoff created Mafia – The Stu Play on which The traitors is based – in the 1980s. Since then, Mafia Has been used as the basis for many game theory experiments and models.

The good news is that Davidoff was not quite right. He believed that the likelihood of the believers of getting out of the evil is no better than coincidence. But many of the studies that model the game find that the chances of victory are fairly equal – and even tipped in favor of the believers in live games, possibly because of the weight of the lies that traitors have to tell.

In other words, forget cold math. If you really want to win The traitorsYou simply have to be more sneaky than everyone else.

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