Download the TLBTLD on the main antipolygraoh.org homepage. Just read some posts on here and that should give a brief idea of what the polygraph is all about. *tricks*

Anxiety

See in particular Chapter 1 of The Lie Behind the Lie Detector, which covers the validity of polygraphy (or the lack thereof).

lane99 wrote on Jan 23^rd, 2005 at 1:48am:

Regarding the incremental validity of polygraphy, the National Academy of Sciences' Committee to Review the Scientific Evidence on the Polygraph notes at p. 214 of its report, The Polygraph and Lie Detection: 

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Because polygraphy lacks both standardization and control, no meaningful accuracy rate is knowable, and no valid inference may be drawn regarding any particular person's truthfulness based upon polygraph chart readings. I think this will become clearer if you read up on polygraph procedure, which is explained in Chapter 3 of TLBTLD. Note also, with regard to your above-cited question, that polygraphers have no reliable way of knowing whether or not a subject has employed countermeasures.

lane99

I have done a lot of research, at my own costs, on the polygraph and I can assure you the contents of the "Lie Behind The Lie Detector" are factual.

I am a 74 year old guy that has the BP and heart rate of an athlete because I work hard at my mine and I mountain climb in the off season when I can.

I have a friend that is a MD. I bet him a steak dinner that I could raise my BP and pulse rate at will. After he hooked me up, I told him to say "when" at the time he wanted me to try. First time I used the mental method i.e., falling out of an airplane. Not extremely high but, significant enough to say that I was lieing. The second round I squeezed the old but muscle as tight as I could. He said "I don't know what you are doing but stop it". Then I told him we would do a third one and I would show him about half way between the significant and the dangerous. Which I did. You can do the same thing at a drug store that has a simple BP machine

I enjoyed my free steak.

lane99 wrote on Jan 24^th, 2005 at 8:57pm:


The plethora of uncontrolled (and, indeed, uncontrollable) potentially confounding variables that beset CQT polygraphy certainly complicate any attempt to determine a meaningful accuracy rate for the procedure. (So, too, does CQT polygraphy's lack of standardization.) But the quoted passage from the NAS report does not offer such difficulties as an explanation for the virtual absence of any evidence on the incremental validity of polygraph "testing." This is an area in which research could be done, but (for reasons that are not too hard to guess) hasn't. For example, a study could be designed comparing the accuracy of decisions made by interrogators using a polygraph versus those made by 1) interrogators without a polygraph, or 2) interrogators using a non-functional polygraph strictly as an interrogational prop.

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But it is virtually impossible to know whether "the right conditions" exist with regard to any particular polygraph examination administered to any particular person on any particular day.

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That which is stated on the AntiPolygraph.org home page is: "The simplistic methodology used in polygraph testing has no grounding in the scientific method: it is no more scientific than astrology or tarot cards." This statement is concerned with scientific underpinnings, not potential accuracy "under the right conditions." CQT polygraphy has no scientific basis as it lacks both standardization and control (regarding which, see Dr. Drew C. Richardson's remarks to the NAS polygraph review committee) and is not supported by any theory that explains known facts. It is in this sense that the comparison with astrology and tarot card reading is made.

While a polygrapher might, under the "right" conditions (again, we can't truly know whether such conditions have been met), "discriminate lying from truth telling at rates well above chance, though well below perfection," so, too, might an interrogator who is not using a polygraph. Again, there is no evidence that the former makes determinations that are more accurate than the latter.

No one can really tell you EXACTLY how accurate the polygraph is or is not.  Lab studies can't replicate the real world.  The polygraph, even by the NAS' admission, is much better than chance.  It's the best tool available, so it will be used until something better comes along.  I think I can safely predict that if you live another 25 years you will see something better come along.  Until then, we should all be thankful for what we already have.