Hi Marty -
I fully agree that the PG approach in the screening of persons for positions of trust probably screens out a lot of persons who most likely are above-average in their being honest.  In over 14 years of conducting psych. interviews with candidates for positions of HIGH trust, I found that an unusual number of candiates who had backgrounds as members of the Church of Latter Day Saints or were AA members who had successfully gone the way of that organization's "12 Steps" tended to honestly 'spill their guts out' in the psych interviews, on testing (such as the MMPI), and in their polygraph interviews.  Such unusual levels of honesty seemly were simply not expected and were interpreted as being highly indicative of underlying psychopathy and the like.  Too much honesty, in such evaluative situations, will create a negative impression rather than a positive one, as one would hope.

Interestingly enough, the overly honest applicants/candidates, in my data base, seem to validly exhibit their true nateure on the PSSPQ' LIE Scfale - they tend to look as if they were responding in a markedly honest fashion.

Roy Stone

lastone wrote on Mar 27^th, 2004 at 6:40am:

Dr. Stone,

While it is clear your work targeted and apparently achieved high correlation with granting of a high level SC, I was unaware you had found some indication it also correlated with future spying.  That certainly seems reasonable otherwise one would have to question the value of the actual SC screening processes.

In my experience dishonest people tend to think others are even more dishonest. There is no honor amongst thieves.

As for how it applies to the polygraph, I am increasingly fearful the polygraph may be screening out highly valuable people due to the intrinisic bias against the most honest (did you cheat in school? sheesh) combined with the increasingly dubious assumption of applicant ignorance of polygraph scoring.

-Marty

This note has two separate purposes.  The first one is to inform readers that Dr. Stone's (who is me) referenced works are not reachable with the internet address given in the notes above.  My web site pages and sections have been placed on another internect connector company's servers.  The 'old'ones that include "sgi" or "stargate" are now obsolete and will only lead to a dead end.  My PSSPQ web site's address is:  http://www.home.earthlink.net/~lastone2/psspq.html
Some of the above reference research works that pertain to the PSSPQ can be found in the electronic Psychology of Espionage Reports, whose internet address is:
http://www.home.earthlink.net/~lastone2/espionage.html

The second part of this note is addressed to some of the comments made in a couple of the above notes.  Stone found evidence that a couple spies produced, when they were being processed for hire by the government, quite normal and average appearing MMPI results.  Also, he reported a lack of correlation between MMPI scale scores and subsequent success/failure to be granted high-level security clearance status.

Stone (i.e., I) found abundant evidence to suggest that his PSSPQ test, in contrast to the MMPI, shows very high correlation with subsequent success/failure to be granted high-level security clearance status.  He also has found, based upon some susggestive evidence, that the LIE Scale, of his PSSPQ test, might identify, persons, who are to be considered for high-level security clearance status, who later turn out to be spies.  However, it is important to note that the PSSPQ was NEVER constructed to identify persons with some potential for spying.  It is strictly developed to accurately predict success/failure to be eventaually granted high-level security clearance status.

George,

Stone's article about the limits of MMPI is not surprising. What is surprising is his suggestion people consider PSSPQ "test" as an improvement. His PSSPQ test was designed to correlate with whether an individual will succeed at getting a TS clearance and requires their honest cooperation. It is designed to save the applicant and employer time and money. I see little evidence it correlates to whether someone who gets such a clearance then becomes a traitor, the subject of his MMPI article.

Of course the funny thing about the MMPI, as with many "psych" tests, is they are based on applicant ignorance and deteriorate rapidly without it. Sound familiar?

In any case I can't help but wonder what Hanssen's MMPI scores were.

-Marty

Quote:


George,
This is very interesting, especially when considered in the context of some of the complaints we've seen from polygraphers that providing polygraph countermeasure information is akin to teaching people how to "beat" the MMPI.  Evidently, MMPI testing is of highly questionable value when predicting security risk, as well.

One might conclude, based upon not one (the polygraph) but two (throw in the MMPI) examples of government counterintelligence procedures which appear to add essentially no incremental value to the clearance process, that perhaps something is very, very wrong with American security procedures.  Indeed, it seems more and more obvious that considerations quite apart from security are taking precedence.

Skeptic

Message edited to update URL in quoted text -- AntiPolygraph.org Administrator

A large portion of "Interviewing with an Intelligence Agency" is devoted to discussion of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory used by the NSA (and other agencies) to screen applicants. In this regard, former NSA psychologist LeRoy A. Stone's article, "MMPI Scores from Two, Major, Traitorous, U.S. Citizen Spies" is of interest:

http://www.home.earthlink.net/~lastone2/twospiesmmpis.html

I posted a note about this article to the popular website, Slashdot.org, where a lively discussion has started:

http://slashdot.org/articles/03/12/05/141248.shtml?tid=103&tid=158&tid=99

Well written prose and absolutely brilliant satire!  This guy needs to share with the writers (or be one himself) of SNL and Comedy Central--the processes he describes are so bizzare and altogether hillarious (obviously from the perspective of one who didn't have to endure such) that they scream to be brought to the attention of the American public through one of these well known venues...

I agree with Kona, Wow!

George,

This guy missed his calling in life.  He should have been a comedy writer!  Great trip report on the entire NSA process.

Kona

The article, "Interviewing With An Intelligence Agency (or, A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To Fort Meade)," written under the pseudonym "Ralph J. Perro" and recently posted on the Federation of American Scientists' website, will be of interest to anyone contemplating employment with an intelligence agency (especially the NSA):

http://www.fas.org/irp/eprint/nsa-interview.pdf