Susan E. Kirkendol

S. E. Kirkendol (Susan E. Kirkendol) was affiliated with the Department of Psychology at Pfeiffer College during the mid-1990s when conducting influential deception research. Kirkendol worked as a research collaborator with Bella M. DePaulo at the University of Virginia, contributing to landmark studies on the psychology of lying in everyday life. While limited biographical information is publicly available, the publication record indicates Kirkendol was active in social psychology research focused on deception and credibility assessment during this period.

Kirkendol's most significant contribution was co-authoring the seminal 1996 study "Lying in Everyday Life," published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, which reported that college students told an average of 2 lies per day while community members told 1. This diary study methodology was groundbreaking in documenting the frequency and nature of everyday deception. The research also explored the motivational impairment effect in deception communication, examining how motivation influences lying behavior. Kirkendol also co-authored "Serious Lies" (2004) in Basic and Applied Social Psychology, which examined autobiographical accounts of the most serious lies people told or were told, finding that most serious lies occurred within close relationship partnerships.

Kirkendol's work with the DePaulo research team has had substantial impact on the field of deception detection and social psychology. The "Lying in Everyday Life" study has become one of the most widely cited works in deception research, establishing foundational knowledge about lying frequency, motivations, and social contexts. The research demonstrated that lying is a regular feature of social interaction rather than an aberration, fundamentally changing how researchers conceptualize everyday deception. These studies provided important baseline data about naturalistic lying behavior that contrasted with laboratory-based deception detection research.

While Kirkendol's research was not specifically focused on traditional polygraph techniques, the work on everyday lying and credibility assessment has important implications for understanding deception across contexts, including forensic and investigative settings. The research team's examination of behavioral cues to deception, lying motivations, and the social dynamics of dishonesty has informed broader credibility assessment approaches beyond physiological detection methods.