Vanessa Van Edwards explains why people touch their noses when they lie: increased blood flow to the nasal wings causes dilation and an itchy sensation, triggered by guilt and fear. But habitual nose-touching from allergies doesn't count. The real tell is a hotspot area, where multiple lying cues cluster together.
This is how the animator got the idea for Pinocchio's nose is some people can feel it. There are people listening who are like, oh my God, I totally feel my nose itch and tickle when I lie. Sniffing, nose touching, nasal dilation. When someone is conjecturing or lying or bending the truth, they will get increased blood flow in the tissue in their nasal wings. It also can cause nasal wing dilation. And so what happens, it looks like this. Um, yeah, I just like I, I don't know why they do that, but there is some guilt in there. It's the guilt-fear cocktail that causes that weird blood flow. With the people in our life and ourselves, we need to understand their baseline, what they look like when they're telling the truth. If someone is always allergic and always touching their nose, that is not a cue for them. But if all of a sudden they get into a topic or they're saying something and all of a sudden we're seeing 3 or 4 lying cues or situational cues to deceit in a row, that's what I would call a hotspot area.
