Most of what you are saying could also adversely affect other medical tests.  Moving, pressing a toe, squeezing the sphincter are also likely to affect most diagnostic imaging scans, making the results unusable, but not invalidating the instrument as an accurate medical device. If you have ever had an MRI or a CAT scan (I have), you have to remain perfectly still.  You have a bad argument here

Has anyone noticed that the only place these arguments are being made is here, anonymously on this site?  Information is circulating that there is a push by law enforcement in at least two other states that currently do not allow pre-employment polygraph screening, to amend the law to allow it.  It will probably happen.  

Were gaining ground, not losing it.  Sites like this actually help.  Most of the posts here actually have the opposite of your intended affect. They help support the belief the system works and bad apples are kept away from the badge.  Nothing you say here will convince a legislature to abandon polygraph testing; it only garners support.  Thanks!

tasercop wrote on Jul 8^th, 2005 at 10:11pm:


Put the legislators on the box.  That'll stop this bullshit junk science in a heartbeat.

Quote:


Bill,

I'm not sure that there are a "million" uncontrollable factors, but I agree there are many.  The underlying problem will always be that polygraph examinations are psychophysiological tests (a merger of psychology and physiology).  Basically there are two personalities in a polygraph testing lab, with all the variables that come with that mix.

As polygraph examiners grow in their education and experience (much like counsellors, psychologists, and others who work in the "soft sciences") they usually acquire better skills and simply improve in the application of forensic psychophysiological methodologies.

You would cetainly agree that it is not unusual for two psychologists to arrive at two vastly different diagnosis.  Worse yet, the history of psychology is fraught with examples of "patients" using any number of behavioral "countermeasures" to fool the unsuspecting psychologist  into making a diagnosis somehow more beneficial to the patient.  Does that mean we should outlaw the practice of Psychology?

Nonombre

Deputydog wrote on Jul 9^th, 2005 at 3:20am:

The polygraphers I've seen would have trouble fitting into a patrol car.

And I hope nobody mistakes my animosity towards polygraphics with a hatred of cops.  Couldn't be further from the truth.

Tasercop wrote:
Quote:


Well you took the easy way out to continue supporting your family and lifestyle...understandable.  However, if not for said accident would you be conducting examninations?  Doubtful.  

Not to be too nitpicky but...I understand tasers assist in subduing many a suspect.  However, I find your screen name to be interesting in that Taser research has been conducted largely by those advocating its use just the same as polygraphy.  Tasers have been the named culprit in the deaths of many suspects such as polygraphy has been the culprit in the death of many careers.  Similar belief in tools used that are largely unproven?  I think so.  I have seen death certificates listing taser as the primary cause of death.  Your credibility has never been in higher question.  Leave now before you relegate your farce of a profession to a more questionable state.

tasercop wrote on Jul 9^th, 2005 at 5:37am:

You have my sympathy and respect for somebody injured in the line of duty.  It's unfortunate that your department couldn't have trained you in a real science -- like DNA or something similar.

So how often do YOU have to take a polygraph exam?  Do YOU use CM's?

tasercop wrote on Jul 8^th, 2005 at 10:11pm:


Tasercop,
Certainly, if you are getting an MRI you need to hold still.  But that’s a rather disappointingly glib way of dismissing my point.  No valid test I am aware of is dependent upon what the examinee is thinking during the test.  If my doctor cautioned me prior to an MRI that I not only had to hold still, but I had better not do long division in my head or the test would have to be repeated, I would seriously doubt the validity of the MRI.

Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong, but if I was being given a polygraph and after each answer I stared at a spot on the wall and began reciting poetry (either out loud or in my head) you would stop the test and tell me not to do that, because you need to have me thinking about the answer I just gave in order to produce any sort of a response.  What the examinee is thinking about is an important part of the polygraph exam, and it is in no way under the control of the examiner.  The best the examiner can do (short of an admission from the examinee) is make a SWAG as to whether the examinee is following directions.  If the conclusions of the “test” are based on such a Scientific Wild Ass Guess it clearly calls into doubt the validity of the entire procedure.

Additionally, as Jeffery also stated, you have my respect as an officer who was injured in the line.

This board has been fun, but a full time job and graduate studies are taking its toll and I'm afraid I won't have much time from now on to come out and play with everyone.    So, I will try to answer as much as I can in what is probably my last post for a while. 

Drew, you know as well as I do that there is no way for a guilty person, or deceptive person, whatever you want to call them, to diminish responses to relevant questions.   In a screening R/I examination there are no comparison questions, so there is nothing to be manipulated.  Know all you want about the polygraph, you can't change your sympathetic responses to questions to which you are lying.  Since you can't change your deceptive responses, the only hope in a probably lie comparison question test is to manipulate the comparison questions.  Countermeasures are very detectable, so this is not really a problem.   

If what you are saying is true,  one would expect a change in the past 10 years in an increase in examinees passing the examination.  It hasn't happened.  I pulled the stats from my agency and in 1994, 92.2% of applicants making it to the polygraph, passed their examinations (not all were hired of course, due to other factors, such as admissions and other negatives in their background).  That is, 92.2% were found NDI (as it was called back then).  In 2004, 95.1% were found to have No Significant Responses.  I think you will agree that a 2.9% increase is statistically insignificant, especially when you consider the next set of stats.   

What has changed is the percentage of inconclusives.  In 1994, 4.6% of examinees were inconclusive.  In 2004 it was .25%.  This is due to the practice of not automatically disqualifying applicants due to an inconclusive or SR screening examination without collaborative information.  We now do follow-up examinations in these cases. 

What else do these stats show?  Most applicants pass the polygraph and that the current trend with researching the polygraph has little or no affect on the results.   

I could give you additional stats on countermeasures detected in 1994 compared to 2004, but you wouldn't believe them anyway, so I'm not going to waste my time.  Its the old saying, "Don't try to argue with a conspiracy theorist, it only proves you're part of the conspiracy" LOL. 

As far as the information about the FBI abuses, I can't post specifics here as it would violate applicant confidentiality, but I certainly believe it.  Two applicants have reported the same experience, from different examiners, at different periods of time in the same year.  The two did not know each other.  Yes, I filed a complaint and hope it will be investigated, not only by the feds, but also the APA (I don't hold out much hope with the APA). 

Brandon,

The easy way out!  I wish.  6 years of college so far.  3 exams a day, 5 days per week.  I do it because I know it works.  I have convicted the guilty, exonerated the innocent and kept the undesirable away from the badge.  And believe it or not, exonerating the innocent is what police examiners do most.  75% of examinees (this is not official, but what most examiners I talk to report) pass a criminal police polygraph.  If you listen to most on this board, you would think we are just out to screw people, but it couldn't be farther from the truth.  Private examiners report just the opposite.  75% of criminal examinations are DI.  Why?  Because defense attorneys tell their suspected guilty clients to take it from a private examiner.  If they fail, it is privileged information.  If we are the ones out to screw the innocent, why are ours 75% NDI?  Makes no sense. 

I don't know for sure if I had not been hurt if I would have become a polygrapher.  It was something I was always interested in, but I had so many other duties and responsibilities that I loved, that I probably wouldn't have put in for it. 

Jeffery,

I have taken 4 polygraph exams in my life (not including the practice ones during polygraph school) and passed all.  I just told the truth.  No, I have never used countermeasures.  Never needed to and know that doing so and getting caught would be the end of a career. 

Well its been fun, but I have work to do.  Maybe I will see some of you in my chair one of these days.