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Hi! First, can I tell you how much I've learned from this site! It's great! 

I do need a little help though to finish up my report on Lie Detection, I need to know how they interpret polygraph test results. 

I know that a spike is a spike, ect... but what I need to know is how they think that they can read the lines on the test results to supposedly tell if someone has been lying. 

If ANYONE has any information, or anywhere they can point me to, please let me know ASAP. 

Thank you so much in advance. 

-Sarah 

Sarah,

If you wanted to know about brain surgery, you'd probably want to talk to a surgeon.  If you wanted to know about auto mechanics, you might want to talk to an auto mechanic.  If you wanted to know about law, you should probably talk to an attorney.  Don't you think you should get your information about the polygraph from a polygrapher who actually uses it?  This website has some good information, but it is very biased, and most of the people posting here are not polygraphers.  They get their knowledge second- or third-hand, from the opinions of other people.  Just like you, most of them knew nothing about the polygraph until they read what others wrote, and even then they simply chose those opinions that supported the bias they held due to their anger or disappointment after failing a polygraph exam.  Many of them failed the polygraph, but almost none of them has ever conducted a polygraph exam.  All they have are a handful of questionable laboratory studies to support any of their claims, not actual experience.  Do you think that you, as a student, will be an expert on polygraph simply because you do a little research on a website and quote the people here who aren't even experts themselves?  Well, that's what these people have done: they have read a few articles about the polygraph and listened to other people who have also read a few articles, and now they think they are experts.

Fortunately, despite his bias as the founder of this "anti-" polygraph website, George Maschke did point you in the right direction regarding polygraph test data analysis as described in DoDPI's manual on numerical evaluation.  That document very clearly explains how polygraphers examine all of those squiggly lines or "spikes," as you call them.

Now, the publication "The Lie Behind the Lie Detector" also contains some good information regarding test data analysis and some of the theory behind it.  However, remember when you read this document that it is very biased in its interpretation.  One might compare it to a Bible after someone who is not a Christian goes through it and crosses out whatever he doesn't agree with and adds his own opinions that were not originally there.  In other words, take it with "a grain of salt." 

If you want to know about the polygraph, here's a good place to start before you take the word of most of these disappointed polygraph failures:   

http://www.polygraph.org/

Look specifically at the FAQ section (frequently asked questions).  That will give you most of what you need to know.  Then you can simply add to your report that there are some people who question the reliability of the polygraph, although they are a tiny minority.

Best of luck in your report.  

LieBabyCryBaby,

Sarah asked specifically for information on "how they interpret polygraph test results." You have referred her to the homepage of the American Polygraph Association. Could you please provide a link to the precise page on that website where she will find more detailed or accurate information on how polygraph results are interpreted than that to which I referred her? The FAQ to which you refer her provides no responsive information whatsoever.

George,

You obviously responded to my post without having seen my last edit which came just minutes before your response.  Otherwise, you would have seen that I did acknowledge your pointing Sarah in the right direction with DoDPI's manual on numerical evaluation.  I believe you are biased and misled in your "anti-" stance against the polygraph, but one thing I must admit is that you do allow and even seem to encourage discussion from both sides of the fence.  I told Sarah to start at the APA website for her report because it has what I believe are all the basics that a person would need to write a report on the polygraph.  Of course, Sarah seems interested in delving deeper with her investigation of test data analysis, and you did assist her with that task.

EosJ:

You are correct that polygraphers might be biased due to the polygraph being their instrument to earn a living.  However, don't forget that at least on a Federal level, most of the polygraphers were employees first and later became polygraphers; therefore, most of them would not fail to earn a living even if the polygraph suddenly became obsolete.  But even those polygraphers who do rely on the polygraph to earn a living should not be generalized as being biased.  Would you label all doctors biased because they encourage people to visit them for regular health checkups or when they are seriously ill?  Would you label all auto mechanics and attorneys biased because they recommend regular maintenance and binding legal contracts, respectively?  Just because someone earns a living doing something doesn't mean that the person can not view his/her job objectively.

Twoblock:

With regard to polygrapher bias, I refer you to what I just said to EosJ.  Now, I agree that Dr. Richardson is an intelligent fellow.  And yes, he has experience conducting polygraph exams. But remember, he is but one opposing voice against thousands of current and former polygraph examiners who champion the polygraph as the only reliable instrument ever designed to verify truth and detect deception.

EosJ,

You seem to be an intelligent guy.  Therefore, I think that if you were given the opportunity to attend DoDPI or another similar polygraph institution, you might actually pass the course.  I can tell you that the DoDPI curriculum is extremely rigorous and intense, and that every class has bright, intelligent people fail.  And it's not a matter of how long one goes to school, but rather the quality and intensity of the training, as well as whether the course is simply theory from books or actual practical learning in a lab setting.  You might belittle "trade" schools, but there are a lot of extremely intelligent people who have no more than a trade school degree. A lot of them decided that they would rather attend an institution that would let them concentrate solely on their desired vocation rather than make them pay an exorbitant amount of money to take courses like basket weaving or ballroom dancing or a foreign language in the name of a "well-rounded education."  Colleges and universities do teach, but so many of them also scam their students by making them pay thousands and thousands of dollars studying courses that have absolutely nothing to do with the students' occupational goals and needs.

The point is that polygraphers can be just as well-trained and professional in their careers as anyone else.  We could argue all day and all night for a year about the scientific basis--or lack thereof--for the polygraph.  I wouldn't convince you, and you wouldn't convince me.  But at least I would be basing my arguments on theory AND experience, which is more than you would have on your side.

Regards.

EosJ:

Unless you are or have been a polygrapher, you have no practical experience.  Taking polygraph tests is not the same as conducting them.  That should go without saying, but I find myself repeatedly saying it to the "anti-" crowd on this website.  Reading a few selected lab studies and biased publications, regularly visiting a website of mostly like-minded individuals, and taking a polygraph or two does not make one an expert on the polygraph process.

So you passed a polygraph or two while using "countermeasures" and you were lucky enough not to get caught.  How do you know you wouldn't have passed the test anyhow?  It's not very scientific for a self-proclaimed scientist/engineer type like yourself to use such subjective and impossible-to-prove support for your opinion.

Aaaah, are we back to that silly "countermeaures challenge" again?  I get tired of addressing that topic, but I will do so once again.

Regarding the "countermeasures challenge":  Even if the pro-polygaph community were to accept such a challenge and "prove" its own agenda, the "pro-" people wouldn't really prove anything since they couldn't effectively equate their laboratory findings to the real world.  At the same time, the "anti-" crowd, which eagerly accepts any favorable laboratory study as "proof" of its own agenda, would justifiably, albeit uncharacteristically, reject such findings on the same basis.  So what's the point?  For those reasons, as well as such a study's prohibitive cost in dollars and time,  the "challenge" is ignored.

No, George, EosJ did not mention the "challenge" specifically, but it is at the top of all the topic listings in the "Polygraph Procedures" section of this website, and it is continually referred to either explicitly or implicitly by most of the "anti-" people on this website who pose as experts on the polygraph without any personal experience whatsoever.

To say that polygraphers can not detect countermeasures is both true and false depending on how you look at it.  It is true that even though a well-trained polygrapher will often notice atypical responses that he or she knows, through much experience, are the result of manipulation by the examinee, he or she may not know exactly which countermeasure caused the atypical responses.  Hence, one could say, "The polygrapher didn't catch the examinee because all the polygrapher could say was that countermeasures were used, and he couldn't say what the examinee did."

You know the old saying "You had to be there," right?  Well, George, when it comes to conducting polygraphs and knowing what I am talking about when I say "atypical responses," you haven't been there.  Perhaps you need to attend a bonafide "countermeasures" course conducted by a reputable polygraph school.  I can tell you that it would open your eyes to what it is possible for the polygrapher to see when it comes to examinee manipulation or attempted manipulation of responses.  But again, you haven't been there.

I know from personal experience what atypical responses look like.  I have caught examinees attempting countermeasures, and have been proven right by examinee admissions.  I never confront examinees just to play a game to see if I can dig up something of which I am not sure, and I do not regularly question examinees regarding attempted countermeasures when the proof isn't visible to me.  Now, that said, could an examinee, with sufficient training and feedback, learn to manipulate his or her responses so that even a well-trained examiner would miss the manipulations?  I think so. But from my own experience, I do not believe there are many examinees capable of such a convincing performance, taking into account such factors as habituation and desensitization over the course of an exam.  What we see instead are the tell-tale consistent signs of atypical response patterns.  I don't know how to explain it any better than this if you haven't been there.  Which reminds me, you haven't been there, George.

You and the "anti-" crowd that follows you just don't get it.  The lab is not the real world.  If you insist on looking at lab studies, you can find studies that both support and refute the reliability of the polygraph, and you can pick and choose whichever ones seem to support your agenda.  The "pro-" people can do the same.  But at least the "pro-" people will admit that even those lab studies that support their view and refute yours can not accurately and assuredly replicate what goes on in the real world.  Why would another lab study conducted as part of a "countermeasures challenge," prove anything one way or another, regardless of who "won"?  At least the "pro-" people have on their side something you do not when it comes to support studies: Confirmation of theory by examinee admissions.  That's real world.  But of course, you haven't been there.

When all is said and done (what a statement, since nothing will ever be said and done that will convince people on either side of the equation of the fallacy of their beliefs), I think it comes down to one basic difference between you and me, George.  That's right, you haven't been there.

Now, I don't expect to get the last word in here.  I find it amusing that an apparent young person's request for help on a school report gets us into a discussion which will get us nowhere. But if our young Sarah still reads this forum, I hope she keeps in mind one thing: Most of the so-called experts on this website, although having failed the polygraph and/or erroneously taken the side of those who have, all have the same glaring deficiency when they want to convince others that they know what they are talking about.  Yes, that's right: They haven't been there.

LieBabyCryBaby

Who calibrates the polygraph machine? Are they ever calibrated by a certified lab? Instrumentation used in techical disciplines, especially in government service, are required to carry certificates of calibration from certified labs whose standards are traceable to the NIST. Yes I have been HERE. Have you? The crucial question here is: Does the polygraph test machine fall into the class of technilogical instrumentation, used for government service, that requires simi-annual calibration? If it doesn't, then it should have no place in determining a persons employment future.

What our young Sarah needs to know is that ONE person with ONE machine has the power to control many people's employment future. Not a BI investigation. NOT a multipul of up to 12people. Even if the machine was 100% correct, ONE person decision is WRONG. And as to quality control!!! Give me a break. Charts reviewed by another polygrapher is quality control?? What are the standards utilized? Is there a written Quality Control Manual containing strict quality standards that must be strictly adhered to. You should know because you should have been there.