The latest series of The Traitors includes an autistic contestant, Dan. For the uninitiated, Traitors is a game show where the ‘faithfuls’ attempt to weed out the ‘traitors’ amongst their group.

Although Traitors is purely for entertainment, including an autistic participant helps shine a light on a subject matter that has serious real-world implications: how others perceive deception in autistic people. This can have very real consequences in the criminal justice system, where autistic people are sadly overrepresented.

We are proud to partner on research that aims to learn more about perceived deception in autistic people and its implications in the criminal justice system. And so, with the current series of The Traitors in full swing, we caught up with project lead and The Traitors fan Tiegan Blackhurst and her research assistant Megan to discuss their research and hear their thoughts on the latest season.

(This article contains spoilers for the current season)

Could you briefly outline your research about deception, autism and the criminal justice system, and why it matters?

Tiegan:
As autistic people may experience differences in social communication and cognitive functioning, they may find it more difficult to lie to others and/or to tell when they are being lied to. This could potentially lead to increased strain on autistic adults’ social relationships or increase their risk of victimisation. Moreover, autistic adults’ natural behaviours may be misidentified as deceptive due to stereotypes surrounding how someone behaves when they lie (e.g., averted eye-gaze, fidgeting) and this could have negative consequences in certain situations such as when interacting with the police.

My research aims to investigate the process of deceptive communication in autistic adults, studying how often autistic adults lie and what types of lies they tell, how they behave when lying compared to telling the truth, and whether they can correctly identify when they are being lied to.

We hope my research will inform the training of professionals within the criminal justice system and lead to fairer outcomes for autistic people within the legal system.

Tiegan, what motivated you to start researching this important topic?


Tiegan:
I identify as an ally of the neurodiversity movement and want to conduct research which will help to improve understanding, and reduce stereotypes and misconceptions surrounding autism.

We believe that our findings may aid the training of legal professionals, including police officers. Advancing their understanding of autism may help protect the future interests of autistic adults in the criminal justice system.

Megan, how did you get involved and why?

Megan: When I saw the Research Assistant role, I had just finished my undergraduate dissertation on deception detection in interviews. I was also undergoing my autism assessment at the same time. I was excited by the opportunity to be involved in Tiegan’s research as it combines many of the things that are important to me.

In early primary school, I remember so many instances where teachers misinterpreted my facial expressions or body language as deceptive and I would get in trouble for things I hadn’t done.

As I got older, I learnt to mask some of these things (which is exhausting!) until I was diagnosed autistic in my twenties and finally understood why people were misinterpreting my behaviour; people did not have a good understanding of how autistic behaviour conflicts with deceptive, neurotypical behaviour. It’s sad and such a shame that I, and potentially so many others, spent so long thinking that the problem was somehow our fault when, in reality, there just wasn’t enough knowledge of how autism and deception clash.

Now, onto The Traitors. Have you both been watching the series? Although the show is for entertainment, what are the connections to your research, given that this season included Dan, an autistic participant?

Tiegan:
I love watching the Traitors. I view it as a large-scale social experiment which I find so interesting! When Dan disclosed that he was autistic on the show I began to consider how my research may link to his gameplay and behaviour on the show. For example, I was interested whether he would lie as often as the non-autistic players (if needed) and how the other players may view Dan’s behaviour.

From the start of this season, Dan did not play the game the same way as the others, which he was very open about. I was interested to see how they would respond to this and whether they would consider his self-interested strategies as suspicious.

Meg:
Honestly, it makes me incredibly happy and proud to see autistic people representing our community in the media. I always have concerns about how neurotypical people will perceive autistic people. But that’s likely due to my experiences and not wanting others to be judged unfairly. Even by applying and being on the show, Dan has helped get people talking about the judgement of autistic behaviour and how wrongly it can be perceived, which is huge!

Has your knowledge of autism and deception through your research shaped how you viewed Dan’s time on the Traitors?


Tiegan:
Initially, I thought that the other players may have been suspicious of Dan if he displayed certain behaviours that are common in autism but also stereotypically believed to be deceptive, such as averted eye-gaze and fidgeting. I was reassured that the other players did not appear to make negative judgements about Dan’s identity based on his behaviour alone.

Whilst I admired Dan’s gameplay on the show, I was not surprised that the other players viewed Dan’s behaviour as ‘selfish’ and were startled by his honesty during confrontations as he did not conform to non-autistic social expectations. Dan said that because he was autistic, he didn’t feel the same pressure to conform to the group that other players may have experienced and he was proud to follow his own path which I respect.

Meg:
As an autistic person, I completely understood Dan’s actions and saw a reflection of my own experiences in the way that he communicated and played the game. I feel that neurotypical people can perceive autistic people as ‘selfish’ or just ‘acting for ourselves’ when that is not the intention; we just have a different view of social concepts and constructs. So, for example, when playing a game where you can only really trust yourself, I would likely take that to mean that I should focus on my own strategies. Not in a selfish way, but because that’s what the game is on paper.

Dan was recently voted off the show, even though he was a faithful. Several neurotypical ‘faithfuls’ on the show talked in pieces to the camera about how Dan played the game, which they perceived to be a different style to theirs. What were your thoughts on this?


Meg:
To be completely honest, it was disappointing to see Dan be voted off primarily because the other players felt that he was playing the game differently. From an autistic viewer’s perspective, it’s obvious that Dan would likely play the game differently from a group of neurotypical players - his brain works differently! Having said this, I can understand how, to anyone else, seeing someone play the game differently from the vast majority of everyone else would raise suspicions that he could be a traitor.

It’s interesting how the group’s decision reflects the treatment of autistic behaviour in real life, and I think this is a perfect opportunity to educate people on the differences between how autistic people engage in communication, both deceptive and in general.

Tiegan:
After Dan was ‘banished’ it was interesting to see the players reflect on their decision to vote him out. Some of the players who voted for him at the round table stated afterwards that they did not think he was a traitor. So it seems their decision to banish him was related to their perception (and potential dislike) of his gameplay rather than suspicion of his identity. I think the other players either did not understand or may not have been comfortable with Dan’s honesty or his strategies which ultimately led them to banish a strong faithful.

Would either of you consider going on a game show like The Traitors?


Tiegan:
In theory, I would love to go on the show. I spend my days investigating how people tell and detect lies in theory, but it would be fun to see this in reality. I would definitely hide the fact that I study lie detection for a living - I’d be banished on day one!

I would find it fascinating to observe so many different people interacting and lying to one another, but people are notoriously bad at detecting lies, even lie detection researchers! I’m not sure I would be any better at spotting the Traitors than the current players.

Meg:
I’d definitely be down for giving it a go - I think it would be fun to challenge myself and see how far I could get! It would be a privilege to have the opportunity to represent autistic females on the show and hopefully help further people’s understanding of autistic behaviour and deception.

Although your research is ongoing are there interesting findings that you can share already with us? And what’s next for your study?


Tiegan:
In our most recent study, we discovered that autistic adults report they would lie as frequently as non-autistic adults to benefit or protect themselves and another person. However, autistic adults were less likely to report they would lie to benefit or protect a larger group. This has really interesting links to the Traitors which involves both individual and group-based deception. It would have been really interesting to see how Dan would have behaved if he had been selected to be a Traitor and had to engage in group-based deception to protect the Traitors.

Our next study focuses on how the disclosure of autism influences the perception of deception. We are looking at how people’s judgements of character and deception change depending on whether or not they are aware that the person they are communicating with is autistic. It was not clear whether Dan told the other players he was autistic. If he didn’t, it would be interesting to hear why he chose not to disclose this information and if this was because he was worried about how the other players would perceive him.