Thanks for the information..  The idea I was going in with was that, no I am not squeaky clean but I have stated what I have done in my application. I have a few things that I am not proud about but as long as I have stated them and not been deceitful, I should be okay in the eyes of the polygrapher since their goal is to detect deceit, right? 
I still meet the standards of the agency I am applying for since the potential disqualifiers I have are beyond the scope stated in the agencies hiring standards. 
Nothing new is going to come out when I test, though I expect to be stressed a bit and if I understand correctly, it isn't the goal of the polygrapher to disqualify me based on my pre-stated admissions, only if I had been deceitful - it is on the shoulders of the agency to hire me given my past, right? Or is it the mindset of the polygrapher that since I have done things in my past, that showing signs of stress during questioning means added guilt or simply the fact that there was truth to some of the questioning at one point of my life.   

T.M. Cullen wrote on May 7^th, 2008 at 6:14pm:



Exactly!  But be careful Cullen, your zealotry is showing (again)...

Sackett

Quote:


That is NOT TRUE.  The nation's top scientific researchers at the National Academy of Sciences found preemployment polygraph testing to be highly innacurate and concluded it did more harm than good.

Mr. Sackett is a polygrapher.  What else would you expect him to say?

Frostbite,

the CVSA is a single channel, unproven, un-researched process.  No verifiable research establishes its reliability or validity in the detetcion of deception  BUT!  It is a good interrogation tool.

Polygraph, on the other hand, uses three channels (less likely to produce false results) and has been successfully researched and used for decades.

Go in, be honest and follow your own good advise; no countermeasures!   

You'll be fine if you have nothing in your background to cause problems.

Sackett

P.S.  All, now for good entertainment, get some popcorn, sit back and whatch the goldfish attack...

While CVSA and polygraph "testing" have much in common -- neither has any scientific basis, and the utility of both depends heavily on the examinee's belief that the device "works" -- the procedures are not entirely the same. There's no reason to suppose that anything you were thinking during your CVSA test systematically influenced the readings of the device. But with the polygraph, mental activity can clearly effect chart tracings, and if practiced timely with the asking of the so-called "control" question, can increase the chances of passing.

Trying to relax and truthfully answering all questions is no guarantee that you'll pass a polygraph (or CVSA, for that matter). If it were, this website would not exist. On the contrary, many (including myself) have adopted the approach you plan on using and wrongly been branded as liars:

https://antipolygraph.org/statements.shtml

If you'd like to know more about polygraph procedure, and what you can do to reduce the risk of a false positive outcome, see Chapters 3 & 4 of The Lie Behind the Lie Detector:

https://antipolygraph.org/lie-behind-the-lie-detector.pdf

I recently took a CVSA. I only had one "hang up" - The question was "Other than what you have told me, ... "
I admitted to the question prior to starting (it wasn't anything bad) 
So when asked about this question and the tester saying there was a problem, I just said that the question just reminded me of what I already told you and it bothers me. I was retested on that question and "passed"
I was asked I think a "directed lie" question, I have no idea if it did anything, I just kept telling myself in my head "I'm lying, I'm lying.." 
I am going to take a polygraph now for another agency and I am a bit nervous. I do not plan on doing any "countermeasures" other than just try to relax and answer. I am already assuming that my relevant questions will probably elicit a raised response - my question is, if I just follow the same idea with my CVSA - explaining why I might have an elevated response, but not admitting guilt, should I be okay?

If this has been addressed in another post, I apologize, any direction to it or response here would be helpful.

Thanks