A few questions for the lurking p/g examiners:

1  Why can't the examinee have an independent person watching over the examiners shoulder?
   (just to ensure that we dont hit the space bar too late or too early )

2  Why wont p/g examiners provide the examinee with copies of his/her charts immediately
   following the examination?

3  Why not place the videocam directly behind the examiner, so that the examiners movements
  - as well as those of examinee can be later observed?

4  Why is it necessary to use the old card trick or stim test ? what is the real purpose thereof?

5  How come most of the complaints on this site relate p/g examiners telling the examinee immediately
   after the exam that he has failed..? No QC procedures in place.?? Using software scoring..??
  Weren't you guys taught to score your charts manually? 

6  What is the APA's latest position on utilising scoring software?

May I say first, I am a Civilian. just like most of you here on this site. I don't like lairs, but doesn't mean I don't lie myself. WE ALL DO. Sometime or another, we do. The Bush Lies. I bet there are hundreds of things he has lied about and no one has caught him or bothered to something about. But when taking a P/G, Why lie to beat it? WHY LIE AT ALL? WHY USE C/M's TO THROW IT OFF? really. if you are telling the truth, WHY DO IT? There is one REAL way to beat it, tell the truth and you win. That's all it takes. The Truth. Didn't mommy and daddy teach you to be honest? or just some liar that cheats his/her way into or out of things? I'm not saying they are good, I am not saying they are bad. I just think that People should GROW UP and HAVE SOME IN INTEGRITY. Truly, If I was an empolyer OR an DA or anything that needed someone to take a P/G, I would take the honest one over the liar because at least I could count on hearing the truth about things when I need it.

Examiner: 
 
You say in part: 
 
“…Yes, an examiner lies during the conduct of an interview.  Every investigator I have ever known or heard of, from law enforcement to insurance to private lies during the interview process.  The United States Supreme Court sanctioned this type of activity decades ago.  This is an appropriate and accepted aspect of law enforcement.  Its not like its any secret, I fail to understand why this is such a significant issue here…” 
 
     You are to be congratulated for your candor and thanked for furthering these on-going discussions.  For the present, without much elaboration (I plan to start a new thread regarding polygraph “examiner” deception), I would like to simply characterize that which you describe as “…examiner lies during the conduct of an interview…” and list certain of those deceptions.  Deceptions for the average examiner would include (but not necessarily be limited to) intentional oversimplification, confuscation, misrepresentation, misstatement, exaggeration, and known false statement.  Amongst the areas and activities that such deceptions will occur within a given polygraph exam and on a continual basis are the following: 
 
(1)      A discussion of the autonomic nervous system, its anatomy and physiology, its role in the conduct of a polygraph examination, and the examiner’s background as it supports his pontifications regarding said subjects.  In general, an examiner has no or little educational background that would qualify him to lead such a discussion and his discussion contains the likely error that gross oversimplification often leads to.  
 
(2)      The discussion, conduct of, and post-test explanations of the “stim” test, more recently referred to as an “acquaintance” test.  
 
 
(3)      Examiner representations about the function of irrelevant questions in a control question test (CQT) polygraph exam. 
 
(4)      Examiner representations about the function of control questions and their relationship to relevant questions in a CQT exam.  
 
 
(5)      Examiner representations about any recognized validity of the CQT (or other exam formats) in a screening application and about what conclusions can reasonably be drawn from the exam at hand, i.e. the one principally of concern to the examinee. 
 
(6)      A host of misrepresentations that are made as “themes” and spun to examinees during a post-test interrogation. 
 
 
(7)      The notion that polygraphy merits consideration as a scientific discipline, forensic psychophysiology or other… 
 
This listing is not offered as complete (nor in any way are the surrounding thoughts fully developed) but merely as a starting point for the following commentary and recommendation.   You have stated that court opinions have been written which sanction the use of deception on the part of law enforcement officers.  Agreed.  I would suggest for your consideration the following points: 
 
(1)      The deceptions cited in such decisions are generally isolated to specific actions/conversations occurring within specific investigations, not pandemic and not necessary to the day-to-day general and routine practices of law enforcement officers. 
 
(2)      The decisions you might cite clearly refer to law enforcement officers.  On what basis would you extend this “license to lie” to civilian polygraph examiners conducting polygraph exams related to purely administrative, commercial, or domestic subjects or even to polygraphers hired by the accused in a criminal matter? 
 
For a number of years I have called for the abolition of polygraph screening.  I have done so for a variety of reasons, the most important of which is what I believe to be the large scale victimization of people, many of whom have presented their relevant testimony on this web site and message board.  I am also offended by any negative impact that pseudoscience has on legitimate science and in particular on meaningful and legitimate forensic science as practiced in the crime laboratory.   
 
Although I hope my expanded ability to opine as a recently retired employee of the FBI will augment the voices of those already carrying the torch and lead to the aforementioned abolition, let me begin by suggesting an intermediate step.  Although I do not believe for a minute that all of the deception, lack of due process, etc. that accompanies  polygraph screening is justified (even when practiced by law enforcement and/or intelligence officers), for the sake of immediate conversation, let’s assume that it is.  If in fact it is proper practice and the realm of the law enforcement officer, then it resides within the realm of an advocate, i.e., those who would investigate and prosecute crime.  As such it is clearly not a role for a neutral party and in the realm of the amicus curiae expert of the forensic science community.  Aside from clearly falling within the role of an adversary and not a neutral forensic expert, I would further maintain, that in the numerous disciplines and sub-disciplines now recognized as being a part of forensic science (my background has largely revolved around the practices of forensic chemistry and toxicology), there is no accepted role for deception in any of these disciplines.  Far from being accepted, any such deception would likely be (and has been) the subject of administrative or criminal inquiry.   
 
Let me summarize what I have just said…the deceptions such as are used in polygraphy, if they are to be accepted, belong in the realm of advocates, like police interrogators and prosecutors and not with parties that are supposed to be neutral, like forensic laboratories.  Before we examine further whether polygraph screening merits continuation in any setting based on the complexities of validity, utility, and deterrence, let’s begin by removing it from that setting where it clearly has no role—the forensic crime laboratory and related professional scientific bodies…  Although there is a clear role for scientific inquiry into polygraph practices, there is no basis for polygraphy being a part of the forensic family or the forensic crime laboratory.