translate the following paragraphs into Chinese.  Distribution of the subjects according to their answers within this criterion is presented in Table 6. The table also
shows the results of the analyses of McNemar’s comparison of pairs.
Perusal of this table reveals that in all areas of the examination in which significant differences were found between
the stories, the results of the examination of the life story and the story of a day were close to each other, and they were
significantly different from the results of the examination of the story from the past and the fabricated story. The results
of the examination of the story from the past and the fabricated story were also close to each other.
4. Discussion
Even from the early stages of this study, we expected to find a similarity between the story from the past and the
fabricated story. Both of them were told after the subjects knew that the study involved lying, and they had a personal
interest in weaving elements resembling lies into their stories from the past to make them escape detection and be considered true. The results of the linguistic examination in all areas confirm this kinship to a high degree.
The similarity between the story from the past and the fabricated story is probably the result of the fact that both are
artificial stories, apparently containing elements of invention, even though the invention in the fabricated story is
absolute, while that in the story from the past is based on actual events. According to Johnson and Raye (1981), the
description of an event more than 10 days after it happened will be less accurate and will contain more elements of
invention than will be found in the description of an event after a shorter time. Fraser (1991) adds that time blurs the
memory, and with the passage of time, what remains are only a general description and some key points of the event
that occurred. The individual supplies the details using invented information based on his past experience or on what
he believes the description should contain. These explanations are likely to clarify the similarity between the story
from the past and the fabricated story—the story from the past also contains invented elements—although it must be
borne in mind that the two are not identical, since at the heart of the fabricated one there is no actual basis to provide the
speaker with key points or with a general description of the event. Because of the similarity between the story from the
past and the fabricated story, in both their artificial elements and the elements invented so as to mislead, we relate to
both of these stories in this study as narratives with invented scripts. We relate to the other two stories, distinguished
from them by many characteristics, as narratives with factual scripts.
It can be seen from the presentation of the results that 13 linguistic characteristics were found which differentiate
between narratives with factual and invented scripts. In an attempt to understand the various psychological
mechanisms underlying the unique linguistic characteristics of the latter, these traits were classified into two groups:
the linguistic manipulations of invention, theoretically performed voluntarily; and the cognitive and emotional
functions that occur as the speaker utters his prepared speech, functions that it is hard for the speaker to control or
whose influence is manifest in differences between narratives with factual and invented scripts. We will present each of
these groups and illustrate the linguistic characteristics they contain using stories recorded during the research.
4.1. Linguistic manipulations of invention
One who speaks with intent to mislead employs three kinds of linguistic manipulations: concealment and vagueness,
persuasion, and the distancing of responsibility, the purposes of which differ from each other. These three types of
manipulation are manifest in many characteristics in the language of narratives with invented scripts, characteristics
missing in narratives with factual scripts, and as such, they differentiate between them.
Table 7 shows the classification of the results of the linguistic examination according to the linguistic manipulations
of invention.
Concealment and vagueness. Concealment is the removal of any term that might make it possible to confront the
misleading text with reality or that can show that what is told is incompatible with the facts, the withholding of ‘‘loaded’’
details from the discourse (details likely to give away the invention), and the use of words that do not contribute any new
information to the story. Vagueness is the use of words whose meaning could be interpreted in more than one way and
which do not provide a precise description of the event. Narratives with invented scripts are those that represent
something that did not exist as if it did or something that took on a form that differs from what really was. The producer of
such a text must see to it that no one will be able to detect in it any hint that the text is not accurate. The speaker conceals
those details that could be examined and obscures the atmosphere that the story reflects by using general terms or by
saying things that cannot be verified (Chapman, in press; Johnson and Raye, 1981; Dulaney, 1982).
Mey (1993), referring to ‘‘The General Principle of Cooperation’’ of Grice, writes: ‘‘When a vague expression such
as ‘‘some’’ or ‘‘many’’ is used, we appeal to the others’ understanding of ourselves as cooperative language users: we want them to assume that we used the right term for the circumstances’’ (Mey, 1993:56). When we lie, the auditor’s
assumption remains intact, so that our objective of misleading him has been realized.