Thank you all for your replies.  I am reading chapter 3 at present, with great interest.  I am wondering about the differences in the test my husband had and the normal forms described in this chapter.  The test consisted of three relevant questions and three other questions:-

Have you ever told a lie to the police to deliberately get someone in trouble? (comparrison?)

Is your  first name ****? (neutral?)

Since you started living with jayne have you had any sexual contact with *****?

Have you ever had any sexual contact with *****?

Since you started living with jayne, other than the one occasion you told me about have you had any sexual contact with any other woman?

Have you ever deliberately told a lie to ( best friend) to get him into trouble? (comparrison?)

These questions were not necessarily asked in this order, and were repeated three times in all.

The comparrison questions do not seem to fit the criteria as described in chapter 3, as the examiner would be expecting a truthful "no". How does this work?

During what I now assume to be the "stim" test part of the test, my husband was given a card and told to answer "no" when asked if he had it.  The examiner called out five cards, but none of them were his card- why would he do this?

Finally, in your opinion, would the fact that he had so recently made a dreadful confession to has wife, that obviously distressed us both terribly, and had not even had a chance to discuss it with her or comfort her- be likely to influence the result of any question conected with sexual contact- or indeed any question?

Thanks again, Jayne.

jayne,

I fully concur with Dr. Richardson's remarks, and would just add that, had your husband been a liar intent on fooling the polygraph, he might have easily done so using the countermeasures explained in Chapter 4 of The Lie Behind the Lie Detector, available for free from this website.

jayne wrote on Apr 8^th, 2006 at 6:56pm:


I've been through several polygraphs.  Some I passed, one I failed.  They all asked the same questions.  Therefore it simply can't be 98% reliable.

However, I will offer the caveat that my polygraphs were all CQT screening polygraphs (notoriously inaccurate) and not specific issue ones (the one you described).

I'm sorry you had to go through all this.  Best of luck to you and your husband regarding whatever path you both choose to take.

Jayne,

I have no idea whether your husband has now told you the complete truth about any sexual infidelity that may have occurred over the period of time you are concerned about.  I can tell you that a control question test polygraph exam result cannot with any seriousness be said to have 98 percent reliability.  If you were to decide the matter by a flip of a coin (i.e. assigning the two conditions, (1) he was truthful regarding the completeness of his admissions and (2) he was deceitful regarding the completeness of his admissions to heads and tails, resp., flip the coin, observe the result and thereby determine the outcome) you would have a 50 per cent chance of arriving at the correct answer by such a procedure.  There is research to indicate that a CQT polygraph exam for an innocent individual may not be much more accurate.  Regards and best wishes....

Hi There,

I am very anxious to have some informed opinions on a situation that I find myself in.  I do apologise for the lengthy details, but feel that  some of these may be relevant.  This is my sad story...

My husband agreed to submit himself to a polygraph test on questions surrounding sexual fidelity.  It was with great reluctance that I resorted to this extreme measure, but unfortunately I had caught him out in many lies, and it all added up to an almost certain adulterous affair.  However he maintained that although his behaviour was despicable, and completely inappropriate, he was never actually  physically unfaithful with the two women in question.

On the day, I was very impressed with the professionalism and thoroughness of the tester, who made what I thought would be a very sordid experiance very much otherwise. He spent over an hour discussing the issues with us both, and then explained that it was important that my husband told me anything he was keeping from me surrounding the issue of sexual contact with other women, othewise he would fail the test.  At this point, my husband broke down, and tearfully confessed something that was a complete shock to me, and had nothing to do with the women in question.  I will not write here about it, but it was extremely painful to hear, and was in has words "even worse than I could have imagined". It was a single incidence, but a huge thing for him to admit.  He told the tester that he had "blocked it out" since it had happened,
some 8 months previously. He was extremely distressed by having to make this confession, but said he knew he had no choice but to do so if he were to pass the test.

At this point the tester suggested a break, and separated us.  He spoke to me alone, and got a little more background knowledge from me on my husband.  He told me that he was very sorry, as I had obviously already had some terrible news, but that he was amost sure that if my husband wasn't forthcoming with any other information that he would fail the test.  He said he could deduce this from his responses and body language. He assured me that he would do his very best to encourage him to admit the rest of the information that he was hiding.  He was particularly alerted by his statement that he had "blocked" this awful event.  I went off to wait while my husband was questioned further, and finally took the polygraph test, ( probably the worst hour and a half of my life).  When I was called back into the room, my husband was sat with his head down, and was crying.  The tester quickly explained that although he had spoken to him at length, and explained all the implications of holding back any information about sexual contact with any woman ( however minor it seemed),  he would fail the test.  He said he was really sorry, but he had offered no further information, and had indeed proceeded to fail the polygraph.  He said that based on his body language, responses, history of the case and of course the polygraph, it was almost certain that he was being untruthful.  He seemed really sorry for both of us, and said that if my husband was prepared now to offer the rest of the information he was concealing, that he would do the test again for free.  I appealed to my husband to take courage and "just get it out", but he tearfully said that he had told me the worst thing he could imagine, as he knew he had come tto pass the test, and had no choice.  He was obviously still very distressed about the confession, and obviously had not even had an opportunity to see how I was reacting to it.  So I went away with a negative result, but with a confession that I know I would never have heard unless my huband had been totally convinced that holding it back would fail the test for him.

We talked camly and at length after we left , during which time my husband unhesitatingly gave me the answers to all the painful questions I needed to ask about the subject of his confession.  He then went on to admit ( having refused to do so for over 3 months), that he would indeed have been unfaithful to me with one of the women in question, had she been interested.   

This really does not make any sense to me, I cannot see why he would confess something so dreadful that I would have never found out about, or even considered, but witheld information that I had expected anyway.  If he knew he was going to fail the test, why the awful confession.  He was sure it would probably cost him has marriage, but said he knew he had to reveal it.  I feel that perhaps the tester may have based has overall findings too much on the pre-test discussions.  My husband does have a few unusual character traits, goes into a very defensive chidlike mode when under pressure, has an inadequate emotional intelligence and I feel may be slightly a little further on the autism scale than the average person.  I would imagine that unless you had known him for quite some time, even a professional would find him hard to read accurately.  If by now you are wondering why I am even bothering to find out about the validity of the test result you could be forgiven, but love is a strange thing  is it not!

Please, if anyone is still awake at this point, in your expert opinion, can I go forward believing I now know everything, or should I let the polygraph convince me that he is still hiding something? If this is the case then for me  we have no future, as you can't even begin to rebuild  trust while you are pretty sure there are still lies between you.  Also if the polygraph result is accurate, it  negates all his fervant promises to never hide anything again, or indeed to repeat any of  the behaviours that have almost ended our marriage. 

I was informed that the result was 98% reliable, and the tester told my husband that if it was a bum result he was one of the unluckiest men he had ever met- he was that convinced of the validity of the result.   

Sorry about the essay, but I really would apprecaite some advice ...