People oftentimes associate specific behaviors with deception, such as lack of eye contact. But there are many reasons a person may not have eye contact with the individual whom they are speaking to, that have nothing to do with deception; for example, cultural considerations. In this Investigator Tip we will address the underlying principles for the proper evaluation of a subject's behavior during the investigative interview. *

Behavior symptom analysis involves the study of inferences made from observing another person's behaviors. On a daily basis we make dozens, if not hundreds, of inferences based on behavioral observations, such as that man is angry, that girl likes me, my child is hungry, my son did something wrong, that driver is lost, those two people don't like each other, Aunt Martha is not taking her medications. This is such a natural phenomenon that it is easy to forget that there is an underlying process leading to these inferences. For example, a six-week-old child is heard crying in the nursery. The child was last fed four hours ago and eats about every four hours. The nature of the crying in the past has been relieved by feeding the child; ergo, the child is hungry. To be completely accurate, when making these behavioral assessments our mind should be thinking, "That man is probably angry," "I think that girl likes me," "I believe that my child is hungry."