The “Liabetes” Epidemic in America

If you spend any time watching the news, it seems everyone is doing it. I’m not talking about sex. I’m talking about lying. But, is that really true? Is everyone really lying with wild abandon today? Do we have an epidemic of “Liabetes”?

Psychologists merge self-control and honesty into a single trait known as conscientiousness. Those who are more consceintious tend to be happier, healthier and wealthier. That’s the good news.

The bad news is that conscientiousness is crashing. Along with self-control, honesty, agreeableness and extroversion. Surveys tell us that nearly 96 percent of adolescents admit lying to their parents, and more than 80 percent of high-school and college students admitted to lying to their parents in the past year.

Of coure we can write this off as “normal teenage behavior,” but the data shows a worrying trend line: neuroticism, on the other hand is skyrocketing. In 2024, I wrote a column about young adults self-diagnosing themselves with Autism and Turet’s Syndrome. Read it here, next.

“Liabetes” on the Interwebs

A quick search of Google Trends shows a 141% increase in the internet searches for “lying” between 2003-2025. It’s not just a sign of the times. It’s a sign of the slow erosion of human flourishing. It’s a sign of the post-modern, spiritual erosion of America.

There’s simply less friction to lying today. Social media, texting, and working from home caused a decrease in face-to-face communication. And, the internet can serve as a virtual launchpad, where there is always a group of complete nutters looking to amplify a doozy of a lie. Telling a fibber on-line that goes viral to millions of people…has almost no consequences.

A 2022 MIT study found that falsehoods on X/Twitter spread six times faster than truths. That’s because a digital lie can go viral in seconds. Just give some thought to the biggest news stories of the last ten years: the murder hornets, the QAnon child trafficking conspiracy , the Wayfair child trafficking scandal and a myriad of other unproven political falsehoods and conspiracies on both sides of the aisle. Not to mention the conspiracy freaks who spread half-baked theories that the moon landing was fake and that 9/11 was an inside-job. Sure it was.

Pants on Fire

During Covid, academic integrity turned into a joke. Remote learning, on-line testing and the rise of ChatGPT created a perfect storm. According to my daughter, a college student at the time, “everybody was cheating and the Professors knew it.” Every test became open book as a countermeasure. The kids were already opening them anyway.

A conversation with a college Professor was eye-opening. He no longer assigns any homework or projects. Why? “Because they’ll just use artificial intelligence and cheat”, he said. There’s no way to stop it. So, he’s returned to blue books and essay assignments written by-hand in the classroom.

A recent survey suggests that 60% of college students admit to cheating. (The rest are lying.) High school students also report high rates: for example, one McCabe survey of high schoolers (24 schools) found 95% admitted to some form of academic dishonesty (copying homework, test cheating, plagiarism etc.)

Some suggest that the mirror is the last honest place on earth. But, the person that lies to us the most is looking at you in the mirror. Nobody can confabulate reality better than us. Not sure? Try these on for size:

• “I’m a great driver.” (statistically impossible that everyone is a great driver)

• “I don’t care what people think about me.” (c’mon, even you don’t believe that)

• “I could totally write a book about that.” (And, yet, you haven’t even started)

All this fibbing has wide reaching consequences. It’s causing a lack of confidence in our institutions (think: church, courts, public schools, Congress). They hit record lows, with only around 28% expressing strong confidence. I wrote about the loss af faith our institutions here.

Trust in corporate media is at a decades-long low: only 31% of Americans express a “great deal” or “fair amount” of confidence in the media—versus well over 60% in the 1970s. For me, that 31% confidence rating seems optimistic. Perhaps it’s one reason why local newspaper subscriptions are on the rise.

That erosion of self-control matters. Personality psychologists have long pointed out that conscientiousness is one of the strongest predictors of life outcomes—stronger than family income, stronger than SAT scores, stronger even than raw intelligence. When kids are conscientious, they tend to study harder, avoid destructive habits, save more, and build stronger relationships. The inverse is just as true: when young people grow less conscientious—less honest, less self-controlled, more impulsive—they tend to struggle academically, professionally, and personally.

We know from decades of research that children and teens who are high in conscientiousness—the mix of self-control, discipline, and honesty—go on to enjoy better health, greater wealth, and deeper happiness as adults. It’s as much a predictor of success as finishing high-school, staying off drugs and not getting”knocked-up” before the senior prom.

Research shows most people aren’t complete liars. But, a small slice of the general population are responsible for over half the whoppers told. On average, Americans tell about 11 lies per week, or one to two per day. What’s striking isn’t just the numbers, but how normalized this has become. We call them “white lies” or “little fibs,” as though the scale of the dishonesty makes it harmless. But taken together, these small breaches of truth chip away at the cultural norm that honesty is the expectation, not the exception.

• I didn’t see your text until just now. (translate: you ignored it until now)

• I confirm that I’ve read the terms and limitations. (translate: nobody really reads that stuff)

• Traffic was terrible (no, you were really inconsiderate)

• I only had one drink (nobody has just one drink")

The simple truth is that honesty and self-control have to be taught. And, they must be reinforced deliberately and consistently. People on line are constantly accusing each other of lying. But, at least one of them has to be telling the truth.

We’re producing a generation more distracted, more anxious, and more dishonest than the one before it, and then wondering why they struggle to build stable careers, marriages, and communities. Lying is not a victimless crime. It corrodes trust—the basic glue that holds relationships and institutions together.

If lying is contagious, then so is telling the truth. Trust is built slowly, over time. But, it can be lost in an instant. Just think of how many politicians lost the support of the public by lying just one time.

Mark Twain was right: if you tell the truth, you don’t have to remember anything. And maybe that’s the cure for “Liabetes”—not more clever ways to cheat, but the simple discipline of saying what’s true, even when it costs us. That’s the kind of self-control that builds families, institutions, and nations worth trusting again.

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