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The Confidence Game - Maria Konnikova ****

One of my favourite TV shows is Hustle, and in effect what Maria Konnikova gives us in this 2016 title is the science of Hustle - the psychology behind the way that confidence tricksters are able to manipulate their marks, whether it’s to sell something dodgy or to live a fictional life. 

Konnikova breaks down a con to its traditional stages, from the first contact (the put-up) to the final subtlety where the true con artist does not go for a single take, but rather makes it seem like things have gone a little wrong, so the mark needs to double down and come up with even more. At each stage we are presented with one or more stories from real life, some quite as remarkable as the fictional cons in the TV programme, others far simpler. From Nigerian princes to Ponzi schemes, all of fraudulent life is here.

The temptation would be to focus on the stories at the expense of science, but Konnikova gives us plenty of depth in psychological studies that help explain why some con artists are so successful - and also why some overreach themselves and fail. It seems odd to be saying this in a review of a popular science book, but if anything Konnikova focuses too much on the reporting of studies, which tends to be rather drily put across, and perhaps could have provided a couple more stories, which are the parts where the book comes alive.

The only real negative I’d say is that I don’t think it’s acceptable these days to write up studies from psychology, especially those dating back to the previous century as many of these do, without going into the replication crisis and the reality that many studies in the field - quite probably including some cited here - are problematic. This can be because the sample size was too small, the maths has been poorly handled or the studies have proved impossible to reproduce. Apart from the mention of what probably amounted to a self-con in a parapsychology study, you might think that all of the studies mentioned were absolutely solid with no basis for concern.

Despite this issue, it’s still an excellent book. It's an effective exploration of what amounts to field trials of human fallibility. While the grifters are hardly ever the loveable rogues portrayed in Hustle, we do even hear about one fraudster with a degree of conscience. And it’s hard not to sympathise with a forger of modern art whose paintings surely demonstrated that the value put on paintings by the likes of Rothko and Pollock is ridiculous. It’s not really about art at all, or the forgeries would be considered just as good as the originals: it’s simply about the fashion attached to the artist’s name. Arguably, it's the art world itself that is home to the con artists here. 

Konnikova does a great job of grounding the reality of the con, and the personalities behind it, in the best explanations that psychology can offer.

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Review by Brian Clegg - See all Brian's online articles or subscribe to a weekly email free here

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