Hidden Brain17 Mar 2025

Did I Really Do That?

Have you ever been falsely accused of something? Many of us think there’s only one way we’d act in such a situation: we’d defend ourselves. We’d do whatever it takes to clear our name — and above all else, we’d never, ever confess to something we didn’t do. But psychologist Saul Kassin says that’s a myth. This week, we bring you a favorite 2022 episode about why we sometimes act against our own self-interest — even when the stakes are at their highest.

In this week's episode, you'll learn about:

Why we often freeze and fail to defend ourselves when someone accuses us of something
The various types of false confessions
What happens in our minds when we're pressured to confess to something that we didn't actually do
How police interrogation tactics are being used in workplaces and other organizations
Potential solutions to the problem of false confessions

For more on the psychological dimensions of criminal justice, check out our episode on the infamous Stanford prison experiment.

And if you'd like to check out the research of Saul Kassin and others on this topic, visit our web page for this episode.

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