Abstract:
"This thesis considers whether or not an interpersonal framework is an appropriate lens to
analyze collegiate level National Parliamentary Style Debate. NPDA, called Parli for
short, is perhaps the largest style of debate in the United States of America. Interpersonal
deception theory (IDT) was created to parse out the difference between noninteractive
deception and interactive deception. This theory found in interactive context that
deception was being used from three distinct vantage points. Those three types of
deception were falsification, equivocation and concealment. Based on experience and
literature several hypotheses are developed to test the saturation level of deceit found
from both the debaters’ own self-reports and the debaters’ perception of their opponents.
Several hypotheses found support for the notion that debaters believe that their opponents
are being dishonest and so to do they question their own veracity levels. For instance, the
debaters reported that concealment was the most utilized form of deception while
falsification was the least used form of deceit. A discussion inquires about these
relationships between the debaters, as well as, ethical implications and points to areas of future research. My findings show that parli debat is amenable to study with the
interpersonal framework set out by IDT and should validate that debaters relationships
influence their uses of deception."