FBI-Reject wrote on Jun 18
th, 2006 at 1:54am:
Very well Nonombre ... but answer me this.
Do you ever go home at night an think, "well that seems like a decent applicant. Maybe he was registering a false positive on the drug abuse question. Maybe it was because he was accused of stealing his grandfather's money when he was a child, when it was really his drug-using cousin."
I don't think all polygraphers are evil, though I believe there are a disproportionate share with inflated egos and a god complex. How many consider the damage they might be doing to our government and to good people?
Since you and "Underlying truth" have asked basically the same question (only I believe you came across a bit more objectively) I will answer you both:
Police applicants/criminal suspects do not provide information in every case in which deception has been diagnosed on a polygraph examination. I will tell you (as many polygraph examiners will) that they do provide information in the vast (and I mean vast) majority of cases. A "confirmatory" polygraph examination is then always run to determine if the examinee is then being truthful.
In the very few applicant cases that are not resolved (<8%), I do sometimes wonder if I registered a FP. BTW, the examples you give of, " Maybe it was because he was accused of stealing his grandfather's money when he was a child, when it was really his drug-using cousin." are not truly FP's, as they are issues that were on the applicants mind that he chose not to share with the examiner. A true "FP" occurs when there is absolutely no issue concerning the examinee on the relevant question and he/she still responds consistantly for some unknown reason.
The paragraph above is why I talk at lengh with each examinee. I am not "coercing" the examinee as "Underlying truth" has implied, but giving him/her a chance to talk about whatever is on their mind and may be causing a problem on the polygraph exam.
To get back to the FP, yes they do occur, that is why if you were to look at my earliest posts, you will see that I support the use of a graded pre-employment process that gives a certain number of points to each stages of the process (interview, written exam, physical, poly, etc), and the point system would be set up so that the applicant could "blow" any portion of the process and still concievably get the job. In this case the "water walking" applicant that many of the posters on this site claim to be, would have stilll gotten the job, even after flaming out on the polygraph exam.
My apologies for any spelling mistakes, my wife is calling me for breakfast and I hate cold eggs.
Regards,
Nonombre