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It is a bold statement to title a book “Everybody Lies.” It disarms as it calls out a universal propensity that causes supposed universal shame. Secondly, it calls into question the reliability of the author, Seth Stephens-Davidowitz, before the book is even opened. That everybody lies, even him, is left unaddressed until the book's conclusion. The goal of this book, however, is not centered on proving the myriad ways in which people are dishonest, but rather the ways in which Big Data in the digital age can uncover those lies more effectively than the long-standing tool of social science: the anonymous survey. The book's subtitle, “Big data, new data, and what the internet can tell us about who we really are,” suggests an undercurrent of dogma akin to “Everybody lies, internet data doesn't.” Stephens-Davidowitz writes from this vantage point his exuberant proclamation of the power of big data to uncover not just lies, but deeper truths about human nature concealed therein. His credentials? In addition to a PhD from Harvard in economics and being a former data scientist at Google, he defines himself as “an internet data expert,” (p. 1). This title appears to be well-earned. A shortcoming, however, lies in the impossibility of being expert in all facets of society and psyche he illuminates with internet data.
The internet is a unique stage on which to play out already well-established psychological phenomena (e.g., the front stage and backstage self), but also is a medium through which to test, with randomized controlled trials and other methods, the veracity of stories we tell ourselves and assumptions we make. Stephens-Davidowitz paints the internet as “digital truth serum” (p. 105), the new secret weapon of social science, capable of uncovering even the lies we tell ourselves. He endeavors this by rendering internet data in contrast to anonymous surveys in which quite often, florid untruths are told. Stephens-Davidowitz consults Roger Tourangeau, “perhaps the world