• Korean Journal of Forensic Psychology
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.155-171
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• 2020

The purpose of this study is to examine the effects of emotional arousal and cognitive load on pupil diameter during a lie detection interview. The guilty group (n = 30) committed a mock crime (i.e., stealing cash) and the innocent group (n = 30) performed a mission (i.e., sending a message) in the research assistant's office. After that, their pupil size was measured using a wearable eye-tracker during the interview. The interview questions were classified with the three cognitive load, three emotional arousal, and three neutral questions. The results indicate that the main effects of group and time were not significant, but the interaction between group and time was significant. It means that when answering cognitive load questions, the guilty group showed larger increase in pupil diameter than the innocent group. The present study suggests that inducing cognitive load is more effective than inducing emotional arousal during an interview when using pupil diameter as an index of deception, and it is expected to improve the accuracy of lie detection.