Quote:Have a polygraph coming up with a federal agency in a few weeks. Is it too late to prepare? I've read over the relevant chapter in TLBTLD. Anything else I should be doing to prepare?
No, it is not too late to prepare for your polygraph interrogation. Note that there is more than just one relevant chapter in
The Lie Behind the Lie Detector. Countermeasures are documented in Chapter 4, but an understanding of the underlying procedure(s) is also necessary. This is documented in Chapter 3.
If the agency with which you are applying is a law enforcement one, you may benefit from reading up on a technique called the Law Enforcement Pre-Employment Test (LEPET). You'll find documentation of this technique in the U.S. Customs and Border Protection polygraph examiner's handbook, which you can download here:
https://antipolygraph.org/documents/cbp-polygraph-handbook-2010-01-07.pdf Documentation of the LEPET begins at page 22 of the PDF.
Quote:Also, what is the device that can be bought at the store to monitor heart rate/blood pressure? I was thinking of getting it. I think it was mentioned in TLBTLD but I can't find it now. Can anybody help?
The device you are thinking of getting is called a sphygmomanometer, or in common parlance, a blood pressure cuff.
Note that federal agencies such as the FBI, CBP, and CIA have very high pre-employment polygraph failure rates, typically on the order of 50% (in the case of CBP, more like 66%). Although polygraph countermeasures can reduce the risk of a false positive outcome, they cannot eliminate that risk. Were I in your shoes, I would consider withdrawing my application, for reasons I've explained here:
https://antipolygraph.org/articles/article-032.shtml Although my commentary was specific to the FBI, the same reasoning would apply with nearly equal force to other federal agencies that rely on the pseudoscience of polygraphy.