I got back last night from a psychology convention, and one of the better sessions I attended was by Dr. Maureen O'Sullivan, professor of psychology a the University of San Francisco. Her presentation was on her work identifying what she calls "Truth Wizards" (the 1 in 1000 people who have both the natural emotional intelligence and motivating life circumstances to become effective and reliable lie detectors - between 80 and 90% accurate in a 50-50 situation). She got through two thirds of her 60 minute presentation before talking about the TV show "Lie To Me".
LTM is loosely based on the career of psychologist Paul Eckman (the character Cal Lightman played by Tim Roth in the show). Ecxman has a nice website at: http://www.paulekman.com/contact-ekman/, and is also running a blog commenting on the show, and often its departure from fact, at http://fox.com/blogs/lietome/. Eckman is one of the most well known living psychologists, and is well known in the field, and probably to many people who took General Psychology in college. O'Sullivan is less well known, but very well respected. O'Sullivan has been Eckman's frequent collaborator, ("Dr. Gillian Foster" played by Kelli Williams in the show). Fox describes her as "a gifted psychologist and Lightman's professional partner who brings balance to the partnership by looking at the bigger picture while Lightman focuses on the details. He needs her guidance and insight into human behavior, whether he knows it or not." O'Sullivan is not a truth wizard herself, but is an expert on human emotion and relationships - particularly love. She got a big laugh by noting that while she does have some similarities to the Foster character, her waist has not been that thin since she was in the 6th grade. I have been following the show since it came on, mostly for work purposes. I don't like it from an entertainment perspective nearly as much as, say Numb3rs (perhaps because the Math Babe is hotter than the Psychology Babe), but it has been interesting. O'Sullivan spent about 5 minutes going over some of the mistakes/discrepancies in the show - the main one perhaps the notion in the show that "naturals" (her "Truth Wizards") are uneducated and tend to have more false positives. She said in fact most of the Wizards" she has identified so far have advanced degrees, and almost all have at least college degrees. They also are marked by their conservatism, and ability to inhibit jumping to final conclusions. What they do seem to have gotten right in the show is that "Naturals" have something of an obsessive passion for the truth (though O'Sullvian says this does not make them socially incompetent). I had to run after her session to catch another - I wanted to ask her why the show went with the prosaic "Natural" when they could have stayed closer to reality and used the more fanciful term "Truth Wizard". --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ TV or Not TV .... Smart (TV) People on Ice! You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TV or Not TV" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/tvornottv?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
