Dear George,

Firstly let me say that my comments were to duc748 and were not directed at any particular site only that he had read both sides and decided that your side was helping undesireables in his opinion.

Because you seem eager to debate me and seem passionate about what you are saying I will respond to your questions .I have done this before with shropshire lad on the nopolygraph site who understood that I did not want to be insulted or attacked and the same goes here because at the end of the day no one is going to change anyones mind and I will keep it on a friendly level and will expect the same or I am not interested.

The first comment I make in regard to creating problems is in relation to the use of countermeasures. Unless someone has access to a trained examiner and polygraph to practice on their chances of pulling off a false negative are small if they are lying. They will increase their chances of being caught using them, and if they are truthful which by your comments everyone should use them because polygraph results are going to victimise innocent people most of the time.

There are a number of cases were people have been caught using countermeasures and they did create problems for themselves as a result.If they were truthful and using them and got caught even worse.

Misinformation is that innocent people are almost always called deceptive. Duc 748 is evidence that  is not true along with a few others posting to us . Polygraph accuracy is as good as chance this has also been refuted by Lykken in a letter to Raskin stateing in his opinion polygraph was 90% accurate if conducted by a competant and skilled examiner.
Iacono also admitted under cross that in his opinion polygraph results were about 75% accurate.  Lykken was also an expert witness for the admission of polygraph evidence.I only mention this because it seems that his ideas influence the scope of this site and hence misleading information.
You cannot guarantee that readers will be able to effectively use countermeasures, yet they are told it is easy to do.
Anyone who  states they pulled it off are admitting they lied on the test and that is who you helped. 

You have no scientific support for countermeasures either yet 
people are led to beleive they work you have no more proof than I do that they don't.   
Doug Williams does not offer a money back guarantee for his manual if it does not work, which you and I both know will not work everytime for everyone . 
I read it on nopolygraph site about telling the truth and passing or stoppolygraph one of them and putting it down to countermeasure use, months ago when talking with shropshire lad and no it is not a confabulation as you put it. Fredfighter responded to the post by correctly calling it a co-measure at the time.

My definition of hype innocent people will all fail screening polygraph tests . I make the claim normal innocent people will pass a polygraph based on reports from the Doe with no false positive errors and the DOD . Since there is no peer reviewed scientific literature on screening that I am aware of  that is where I base my opinion. 

I am not saying that errors do not occur they do,I am saying that the amount of errors you inferr occur are not supported by offical government reports. Screening studies conducted for Doe indicate poor detection rates and false positives are not the main problem in lab studies. 

Screening polygraph tests are controversial and I have been following the NAS study with interest as I am sure you are. 

All the best

Paul Woolley. 


   

lielabs and beech tree,
     I too have become interested in this debate. Although I'm no expert (he!!, calling me ignorant on the topic would be a compliment), and the polygraph test is over for me, I would like to comment on this site.
    Although there are people out there that look for this site, so they may cheat the system, or try to cheat the system, that is not all this site is used for. That, IMHO is the negative side to this site and one to which I don't subscribe.
    The positive side to this site, is that it is used by those that most likely failed their poly test, but where truely honest. A place for them to talk with others that the same thing may have happened. This is a good thing and should be applauded. And it's also something that can't be found on the polygraphpalace.com site. 
     I have had a great discussion with several members of this board (in particular) therock about my philosphy with regards to the polygraph. Granted I'm the minority, if not the only here, with my view, there maybe others out there that now realize they don't have to use countermeasures, based on what I've said. 
     That was my only reason for posting on this site.

With regards to beech trees comment:
Quote:


I would say based on what I saw that some countermeasures would be seen on the graph...in particular the breathing. My polygrapher was very honest with me about the polygraph. He said straight out, that the polygraph was not pure science, but an instrument to measure changes in the human body. It's those changes that he reads. He took 6 poly's to basically take an average of all the questions he asked. Call it medicine man reading, voodoo, magic, or what have you. I found my polygraph pretty damn accurate. 

Would I ever want to take another polygraph...no way. It's the equivalent of being hit with an emotional billyclub. I felt completely drained and naked at the end of my poly.

Dear Paul,

Thanks for taking the time to reply and clarify your remarks. I understand that your comments were not directed at any one website in particular, but I think you made some generalizations that don't stand up to scrutiny, as I'll discuss below, among other things.

With regard to your claim that "these Anti sites create more problems for people than they ever resolve" you explained:

Quote:


The assertion that hands-on training is necessary for the successful employment of polygraph countermeasures is ridiculous (but no doubt comforting for the polygraph community to believe). Charles Honts has suggested that that his research indicates "that in order for  countermeasures to be effective the subject must receive some  specialized training in their use and that merely furnishing a subject with information about countermeasures does not appear to work." (testimony in United States v. William Galbreth).

But in Honts' research purporting to indicate that merely being furnished with information about polygraphy doesn't enable persons to defeat polygraph "testing" and that "hands-on training" is required, the "information only" subjects of his experiments were provided a maximum of 15 minutes of instruction!

Is it reasonable to suppose that anyone reading about how to pass a polygraph "test" will limit his study to 15 minutes?! If you were studying polygraph countermeasures -- whether to protect yourself from a false positive outcome or to deliberately deceive a polygraph examiner about relevant issues -- would you devote no more than a mere 15 minutes to it?

Moreover, those subjects who were given "hands-on training" in countermeasures received a maximum of 30 minutes of instruction. Graduate students read them a script teaching them about the theory of the "Control" Question "Test" and explaining how to apply either physical or mental countermeasures while answering the "control" questions. Then the volunteers practiced a bit. 30 minutes maximum.

But even this is an unrealistically short period of "training" for someone for whom the outcome of a polygraph "test" is of major importance. If  anything, Honts' research suggests that it takes little instruction and practice to learn how to defeat a polygraph "test."

So Honts et al.'s countermeasures studies are flimsy support for your assertion that, "Unless someone has access to a trained examiner and polygraph to practice on their chances of pulling off a false negative are small if they are lying."

You further assert that such persons, "will increase their chances of being caught using them." On what basis do you make this claim? In Honts et al.'s countermeasures studies, experienced polygraphers were unable to identify countermeasures attempts at better than chance levels.

When you say, "by your comments everyone should use [countermeasures] because polygraph results are going to victimise innocent people most of the time." Here, you've mischaracterized my comments. I've never claimed that polygraph results are going to victimize innocent people most of the time. But for innocent persons, there is a significant risk of a false positive outcome, and it is thus in their interest to do that which is possible to minimize that risk.

While there may be instances where persons have been accused of using countermeasures have admitted it, the truth of the matter is that the polygraph community has no reliable method for detecting the kinds of countermeasures described in The Lie Behind the Lie Detector, and the only way that the use of such countermeasures can be confirmed is if the subject admits it.

When you claimed that "these Anti sites create more problems for people than they ever resolve," you made a claim that you cannot possibly know to be true.

You also write:

Quote:
 

AntiPolygraph.org doesn't claim that "innocent people are almost always called deceptive," and I'm not aware of any other antipolygraph website that does. But innocent people are called deceptive often enough based on the pseudoscience of polygraphy that it is prudent for innocent people to take measures to protect themselves.

With regard to the validity of polygraphy, Lykken's and Iacono's (or anybody's) opinions regarding how often polygraph interrogators make correct decisions is no evidence whatsoever for the validity of the polygraph technique itself, which both Lykken and Iacono reject.

It remains the case that "control" question "test" polygraphy has not been proven by peer-reviewed research to work better than chance. And as explained in Chapter 1 of The Lie Behind the Lie Detector and the sources cited there, no true validity is possible for CQT polygraphy because the procedure lacks both standardization and scientific control. Regarding this latter point, you may find Dr. Richardson's comments to the National Academy of Sciences regarding scientific control and polygraphy to be instructive.

You also write: 

Quote:


You're right. We cannot guarantee that readers will be able to effectively use countermeasures, but that doesn't change the fact that it's not terribly difficult to do. We provide readers with detailed information on polygraph countermeasures along with ample references that they can check. The choice of whether to use countermeasures or not is necessarily left to the reader.

Quote:


It should be borne in mind, Paul, that in every polygraph examination, at least one person truly is deceptive: the polygraph examiner. The person who chooses to use polygraph countermeasures may or may not have lied with regard to the relevant questions. While AntiPolygraph.org's purpose is to help innocent/truthful persons protect themselves from polygraph abuse, it goes without saying that this same information could also be used by guilty/deceptive persons. This is unavoidable.

Quote:


While polygraph countermeasures, like polygraphy itself, is not the kind of procedure for which any predictive validity can be determined, Honts et al.'s peer-reviewed countermeasures studies (abstracts are provided in the bibliography of The Lie Behind the Lie Detector) provide a reasonable basis for the belief that such countermeasures are simple to learn, likely to be effective, and that polygraphers cannot detect them.

With regard to your remark, "The funny thing about anti sites is that if you used countermeasures and told the truth you beat the polygraph [sic]" you explained:
 
Quote:


I somehow couldn't find the message to which you refer. Perhaps you could post a link? In any event, is it reasonable to characterize the arguments of not just one antipolygraph website, but all, on the basis of one message posted by a user of a single message board? All you've really done here is to raise a straw man argument. Nobody is claiming that if a truthful person successfully uses countermeasures to protect himself against a false positive outcome, he has somehow "beaten" the polygraph.

Quote:


AntiPolygraph.org doesn't make this claim, and I don't know of any reasonable person who does. More apparent confabulation on your part, Paul.

With regard to your claim that "[a] normal honest person will have no trouble passing a test," you explained:
 
Quote:


Certainly, almost everyone who submits to a DOE or DoD counterintelligence-scope polygraph interrogation ultimately passes. But this is only because DOE and DoD polygraphers are ultimately ignoring the charts and giving a pass to those who don't make any substantive admissions, as I explained in a letter to U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. In this context, it is precisely the honest person who admits all that is most likely to "fail," while the dishonest person who steadfastly denies everything will almost certainly be cleared in the end.

But such is not the case in other agencies, especially in pre-employment screening. About 20% of FBI applicants who make it as far as the polygraph are rejected on the basis of their polygraph results. In the Los Angeles Police Department, the comparable figure is about 50%. In the process, many truthful applicants are being wrongly branded as liars.

I agree with you that screening "tests" are controversial. But it is not just screening "tests" that are controversial: all CQT polygraphy is controversial because the procedure is, intrinsically, a fraud. But with more and more people who are subjected to polygraphy discovering "the lie behind the lie detector" for themselves, the polygraph house of cards is poised for collapse.

Again, I thank you for clarifying the comments you posted to the PolygraphPlace.com message board. If you (or anyone else in the polygraph community) find anything on AntiPolygraph.org that you think is false, misleading, or otherwise unfair, you're welcome to post your views on this message board (anonymously, if you prefer). That way, your comments will reach the growing numbers of people who are coming to this site to learn about and discuss polygraphy. (Your posts won't be deleted, like mine would be if I posted to PolygraphPlace.com.) 

Quote:


Mr. Wooley, two people were untruthful in that room on Interrogation Day. Even if I *had* been 'truthful', you and I both know the polygraph interrogator expects me to lie.

Quote:


Perhaps I misunderstood you then when you wrote:

Quote:


That, Mr. Wooley, is the accusation you made by way of inference in an earlier posting in this thread. You inferred that George et al were spreading 'misinformation' by asserting that innocent people are almost always called deceptive [in a polygraph interrogation]. So, I am having difficulty with your new position, where you now write 'no one is making that assertation here in relation to innocent people almost always being called deceptive on screening polygraph' when you in fact made that accusation just a few posts ago. What gives?

Quote:


You would have to ask the site owners. IMHO, this site is dedicated to exposing the fraud of polygraphy as a valid testing instrument, as well as the uses and abuses of polygraphy by the federal, state, and local governments.

Beechtrees,

The general idea protrayed on all anti sites is that polygraph will call innocent people liars without exception you will notice I was quoteing not changing my position you thought that I was making that claim I was only repeating what had been said by George my conclusions will make more sense if you read it in the cintext it was given my position remains the same only that George has a slightly different angle to Doug as George clarified his position on that subject.   

Just because an examiner expects a subject to lie does not mean the examiner has to lie to the subject to get them to . If I ask a question to a person they make the choice if they are going to answer truthfully or not I don't make that choice for them. The person does not have to be lieing anyway if they are not certain of their answer a response will be elicited. Some examiners may lie to subjects to set up controls but not all of us do, that is a generalisation that this site makes that is not true. 

The c/measure device is called the 76875as it is placed on the seat and sat on by the subject also under arms and feet is an update on strain gauges that could not detect sphincter contraction very well. This was designed to detect that sort of c/measure. It works on a similar principal to cario cuffs and will detect subtle movements. Have another look at Lafayettes site you will find it there.            

Duc748,

A variety of things (some contained within private correspondence so I will not comment further--I raise the issue at all only because your last post is potentially misleading to others) have made it abundantly clear that there exists considerable confusion on your part regarding the identification of control and relevant questions utilized during your exam.   I don't attribute poor pre-test research and review or a lack of ability on your part as being the root cause of your difficulty in making such identifications and distinctions.  I would strongly suggest that you consider another possibility.  I believe it quite likely that your examiner, while not necessarily telling you bold-faced lies, misled you.  I think it highly likely that you were intentionally left confused, not realizing that control questions were in fact not relevant questions and that they are not scored as such but in opposition to or in comparison with relevant questions.  You have continuously drawn significance from your experience (having taken and passed a polygraph exam) where none exists.  Nothing about your experience or your telling of it would be the basis for suggesting to others that they need not consider the use of countermeasures nor that they would not be misled by their polygraph examiner during their examination process.  You are most assuredly entitled to exuberance over your good fortune (polygraph result) and bright prospects (future career), but should not make light of the experiences of the many who visit this site and who were not so fortunate nor should you serve as an impediment to the necessary preparation of the many who will yet face polygraph screening exams.

Dear Mr. Richardson,

I'm addressing this inquiry to you directly based on your past employment w/ the FBI. I took 2 poly tests. After the first one, the examiner told me that my answers were inconclusive, but he said several times that he believed that I had been truthful. He told me some people are not good candidates for poly tests, specifically people w/ legal background (like me). He then told me that the test would be sent to D.C. the following day for their review.
2 days later, I was contacted by another examiner who scheduled a second poly test. It is this test that I had problems w/. The second examiner knew about the first test and its results. He discussed it w/ me. I explained to him that I was very nervous because I had obviously done poorly on the first test. He asked how did I know that. I responded that the first examiner had kept asking me the same questions in each of the sets he had administered, thus leading me to believe that he had problems with my answers to those questions. 
Neither the first nor the second examiner ever explained to me the proper procedure in the sense that I would only be asked the same questions; and no new questions may be asked during the test. When the first examiner failed to change his questions w/ each new set, I became more and more convinced that I was failing the test.
The second examiner did not bother to explain to me that that was how the test is administered. He never corrected my misunderstanding of the procedure. He never told me that I may only be asked the same questions and the fact that teh first examiner repeated the same questions did not mean that I had failed them.
As a consequence, when the second examiner proceeded w/ his test and when he asked me the same questions in each of the sets administered, I panicked and was worried about failing the test while taking it. 
After the test, he told me that I had failed it. He then proceeded to tell me that he had the impression that I had done something very bad prior to coming to this country (over 18 years ago) and that I was hiding something. He asked what bad things have I done that are still haunting me. I had done none; I grew up in a war zone; I had no luxury in life, other than fight to survive on a daily basis. I told me about my background, about the war, and about having missed the teenage years because of war; and more importantly, I told him that I had never been exposed to any drugs (since that seemed to be his interest) and that even to this date I've never seen drugs w/ my own eyes (other than on TV and in movies). I was told on at least 4 occasions that the FBI was only interested in great, honest people, but they (the FBI) were not taking away my citizenship. Now, on the top of being misled into believing that I was failing the test (because the same questions were repeated in each test), I had to worry about my citizenship. Is that normal procedure? Was that conduct ethical? Do I have any remedies based on any of the grounds outlined above?