Dr. Timothy Levine, Ph.D. is Professor and Chair of Communication at the University of Oklahoma, in Norman OK . Levine teaches and conducts research on topics related to deception, interpersonal communication, persuasion and social influence, cross-cultural communication, and social scientific research methods. In addition to teaching graduate and undergraduate classes, Levine does training for police, attorneys, and people in the intelligence and counterintelligence communities. Before OU, he held faculty appointments at University of Alabama at Birmingham, Korea University, Michigan State University, Indiana University and University of Hawaii. Levine has published more than 160 refereed journal articles reporting original research related to communication and he is an internationally recognized leader in deception research. He is the author or co-author of Information Manipulation Theory, Truth-Default Theory, the Veracity Effect, the Probing Effect, and the Park-Levine Probability Model. His research on deception has been funded by the National Science Foundation, U.S. Department of Defense, and the FBI. His current research focuses on what makes some people more believable than others, the prevalence of lying, and on effective interrogation strategies. Levine’s book, Duped, describes his program of research on deception relevant to Truth-Default Theory.
Levine grew up in Scottsdale AZ. He did his undergraduate in psychology at Northern Arizona University. He switched to communication for his Masters at West Virginia University. He obtained his Ph.D. in communication at Michigan State Univ. in 1992. He did both his MA thesis and Ph.D. dissertation on the topic of gaining compliance. During his graduate education, he studied under Frank Boster, Gerald R. Miller, John E. (Jack) Hunter, Steve McCornack, Buddy Wheeless, and Jim McCroskey. Levine currently lives in Norman, OK.