The real question isn’t whether you are being lied to, but why ‘tall tales’ land so heavily with you When I was 21, I went on a girls’ trip with university friends. Over dinner , one of the girls, who was known for being a liar, announced she had just heard from her doctor that she had cancer and needed chemotherapy . She never had chemotherapy and most of the group (especially me) stopped socialising with her after that. Five years later, she admitted she had been lying. Recently, a new person