Det händer att människor som anklagas för någon överträdelse bekänner att de har gjort den fastän de inte har det. Hur kan detta förklaras? I den korta texten ”Evolutionary Psychology and False Confession”, publicerad i American Psychologist, ges en förklaring från evolutionär psykologi:

If innocents perceive the likelihood of their vindication to be outweighed by the reality of other people’s false belief in their guilt, then false confession may have been an adaptive strategy, particularly in ancestral environments, in which trial by jury, judicial appeals, or DNA exclusion could not provide exoneration. Through confession, the individual has available multiple proximate means of achieving ultimate payoffs in genetic-fitness terms. Gold and Weiner (2000) showed that when confession occurs with remorse signals (such as those accompanying affective guilt), observers are more likely to reason that recidivism is unlikely or that the person has suffered enough through feeling ashamed, thus promoting forgiveness and a reduction in punishment. In the ancestral past, the advantages of false confession may have therefore over- ridden protestation over suspected guilt; denying one’s guilt, even if one was innocent, might have had a more calamitous impact on reproductive success if such protests fell on the ears of group members who held uncompromising false beliefs.

Detta låter inte helt orimligt. Det som förundrar mig är att de anklagande mildrar sin dom vid en bekännelse, som tolkas som ånger. På vilket sätt är det relevant? Utan en sådan reaktion från dem skulle poängen med falska bekännelser, i det perspektiv som presenteras ovan, i hög grad försvinna.