Examiner,

When you say, "Okay, we agree," do you mean that we agree that it's really not in the best interest of a person accused or suspected of a crime to make a post-test confession? If that's not what you meant, could you clarify?

I'd like to discuss a couple points you directed to Gino and wannabe. To Gino, you wrote:

Quote:


In Chapter 4 of The Lie Behind the Lie Detector (Polygraph Countermeasures), we discuss three basic methods for protecting oneself against a false positive outcome:

1. refusal to submit to polygraph interrogation;
2. complete honesty;
3. polygraph countermeasures.

We present these options in that order, and leave it to the reader to decide how to procede. Note that we do not begin "by advising people to use complete honesty" but by discussing the option of refusing to submit to a polygraph interrogation. We explicitly recommend this course of action to anyone who stands accused of a crime.

The "complete honesty" approach does not mean that we advise guilty people to confess. Rather, it is an approach by which one can attempt to be excused from having to submit to polygraphic interrogation by disclosing up front that one understands that polygraph "testing" is a fraud. We note at p. 67 of the 1st edition: "We believe that the ethically preferable choice for those facing polygraph interrogation is to either refuse to submit or to use the 'complete honesty' approach (or both). But we are also aware that these two choices may entail serious adverse consequences."

Now, Examiner, you have confirmed that you "don't believe knowledge [of] the control question test is a barrier." I suspect that a lot of polygraphers feel the same way. Indeed, the narrow self-interest of those in the polygraph community dictates that they must (at least publicly, if not privately) adopt the position that knowledge of the CQT is no barrier, because otherwise, the polygraph house of cards would rapidly come crashing down.

But let me ask you this: if a subject tells you that he has read The Lie Behind the Lie Detector, that he understands that the stim test is a trick designed to dupe him into believing that polygraphy really works; if he tells you that he understands that you are going to decide whether he is truthful or deceptive by comparing his physiological responses to the "control" questions vs. the relevant questions, and that the irrelevant questions don't "provide a baseline for truth" but are instead not scored at all; if he tells you that he has studied and trained himself in the employment of polygraph countermeasures, and, despite all this, you procede to administer a CQT, then on what theoretical basis do you expect the truthful subject to produce stronger responses to the "control" questions and the guilty subject to produce stronger responses to the relevant questions?

Now, the 3rd option we provide, for those who are concerned that the "complete honesty" approach will be unfruitful, is polygraph countermeasures. Our recommendation to those who employ countermeasures not to make pre-test or post-test admissions (including regarding their knowledge of polygraphy and polygraph countermeasures) if accused of deception or having attempted countermeasures is hardly "in conflict" with this approach.

Regarding our chapter on grievance procedures (Ch. 5), you write: "Then it says if that advice wasn't followed, here's the grievance procedure." Not quite. Chapter 5 opens: "If you have read this book prior to your polygraph interrogation, you should not need to contest your polygraph results. However, if your first exposure to this book comes after you have already submitted to and 'failed' a polygraph 'test,' read this section carefully."

I respectfully submit that a review of The Lie Behind the Lie Detector suggests that you have misconstrued the approaches we present for avoiding a false positive outcome (you even got the order in which they are presented wrong).

In the case of your subjects who, to your chagrin, terminated their post-test polygraph interrogations, Gino is correct in pointing out that they did not follow our explicit recommendation that anyone accused of a crime should refuse to submit to a polygraph "test." This is no cop-out. If you still disagree, and/or think that we are somehow blameworthy, please explain.

You also wrote to wannabe:

Quote:


As we point out in Chapter 1 of The Lie Behind the Lie Detector, polygraphy has not been proven by peer-reviewed research to work better than chance under field conditions. Indeed, CQT polygraphy is not a standardizable, scientifically controlled procedure such that it could have any true validity. A plethora of uncontrolled (and uncontrollable) variables may influence the outcome, including, perhaps most significantly, whether the subject knows how to beat the "test."

I think wannabe and others refer to "coin flip" accuracy as meaning "no better than chance." While polygraphy has not been shown to work better than chance, the "coin flip" metaphor may be misleading to the extent that it suggests that polygraphers are wrong half the time. This need not be the case. For example, when you polygraph a servicemember who has tested positive on a urinalysis test, you have strong presumptive evidence that the person knowingly used an illegal drug. If you simply decided to "fail" all such persons when they come to you for a polygraph "test," you'll likely be right much more than half the time, even though such a methodology is completely invalid from a scientific standpoint. Similarly, in the case of counterintelligence-scope polygraph screening, if you simply decide to "pass" everyone, you'll be right almost all the time, because almost no one is a spy or saboteur. And yet again, this technique is completely invalid.

For further reading on how an invalid technique can seemingly work better than a coin flip, see Chapter 5 of the 2nd edition of David T. Lykken's book, A Tremor in the Blood: Uses and Abuses of the Lie Detector (New York: Plenum Trade, 1998).

Examiner,

You wrote:

Quote:


I assume you're referring to my explanation of how a completely invalid procedure can be right more than half the time (seemingly better than a coin flip):

Quote:


I did not mean to suggest that you personally score your polygraph charts on the basis of the simplistic methodology I described above. Perhaps it would have been better had I substituted "one" for "you," but I think if you re-read my post, it's unmistakably clear that I was describing a hypothetical situation.

(It is noteworthy, however, that according to the data provided in the DoD Polygraph Program Report to Congress for Fiscal Year 2001, all DoD counterintelligence-scope polygraph exams in that fiscal year seem to have been scored on the basis of passing everyone who did not make "substantive" admissions. For more on this, see my Open Letter to Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld on Waste, Fraud, and Abuse in the DoD Counterintelligence-Scope Polygraph Program.)

You also wrote:

Quote:


Note that it was not our advice to criminals in particular that they should not submit to a polygraph interrogation. Rather, that is our advice to anyone -- innocent or guilty -- who is suspected of a crime. And you are mistaken if you suppose that we agree that countermeasures cannot help criminals to beat the polygraph. "Control" Question "Test" polygraphy is easily defeated through the use of simple countermeasures that polygraphers cannot detect.

Examiner,

You wrote:

Quote:


On what basis do you say that polygraph screening and the polygraphic interrogation of criminal suspects are "completely different?" They have a lot in common:

• Both depend on the polygrapher lying to and deceiving the subject about the nature of the procedure.
• In both, truth vs. deception is (at least in theory) determined based upon a comparison of the subject's physiological responses to "control" vs. relevant questions.
• The validity of neither has been established by peer-reviewed scientific research.

With regard to polygraph countermeasures, I certainly wouldn't discourage anyone from reading the discussion in the thread To those who have tried countermeasures. A fuller discussion of polygraph countermeasures appears in the thread, Countermeasure considerations for the innocent, which Dr. Barland started. Critical readers may judge for themselves whether DoDPI can detect countermeasures attempts better than chance (a claim Dr. Barland never actually made).

At the 23 July 2001 meeting of the National Academy of Sciences/National Research Council Study to Review the Scientific Evidence on the Polygraph, Professor Charles R. Honts of Boise State University stated that polygraphers cannot detect the kinds of countermeasures discussed in The Lie Behind the Lie Detector. To listen to his remarks on polygraph countermeasures in RealPlayer format, click here.

Regarding countermeasures, you wrote:

Quote:


This seems to be an admission that the only people you've detected attempting to employ countermeasures were those who confessed.

You concluded:

Quote:


Regarding your 17 subjects who admitted to having attempted countermeasures, you did not clearly state what techniques they attempted. I cannot know whether they ineptly attempted the kind of countermeasures described in The Lie Behind the Lie Detector or some other (less effective and perhaps even counterproductive) technique. Is it your contention that all 17 admitted to having read The Lie Behind the Lie Detector and attempted the countermeasures described there?

In peer-reviewed studies by Charles Honts and others, roughly 50% of programmed-guilty subjects were able to beat the "control" question "test" with not more than 30 minutes of instruction in the kind of countermeasures described in The Lie Behind the Lie Detector (and experienced polygraphers were not able to detect the countermeasures). Anyone planning to employ polygraph countermeasures would be well advised to spend more time than 30 minutes in preparation.

Examiner, 

You wrote:

Quote:


I would not dispute that it is possible that you have indeed polygraphed 17 subjects who admitted to having obtained The Lie Behind the Lie Detector and practiced and then employed the countermeasures decscribed therein. But I don't believe you.

I cannot reconcile your above claim with what you wrote in your original private message to Gordon Barland:

Quote:


Your words to Gordon strongly suggest that you only recently learned about the existence of The Lie Behind the Lie Detector. If I am wrong about this, I apologize for having questioned your word, and suggest that you contact Dr. Andrew Ryan, chief of the DoDPI Research Division, at research@jackson-dpi.army.mil, as I suspect the charts of these 17 individuals will be of great research interest to DoDPI.

You also wrote:

Quote:


Before addressing the point you raise, I would remind you that our purpose in writing The Lie Behind the Lie Detector and making it publicly available for free is to help truthful persons to avoid a false positive outcome, not to help liars beat the system.

In the laboratory studies by Honts et al., about half of programmed guilty subjects were able to beat the polygraph after no more than 30 minutes of training (and, as I mentioned earlier, experienced polygarphers were not able to detect the countermeasures at better than chance levels). For persons who face a polygraph interrogation in the real world, the stakes are typically high. A person's career or even his liberty may depend on the outcome. Hence, it is, in my opinion, only prudent that someone planning to use countermeasures to protect himself against a false positive outcome should invest more than 30 minutes studying and practicing.

Psuedo Relevant:

    A very good choice of screen name, very appropriate.  Bring something of substance to the discussion and I'll be happy to comment.

George , it wasn't an ad hominem attack, merely an observation that his/her screen name and his/her style match.  I don't intend to be goaded or baited into the type of discussion it appears to me he/she wants to have.

After reading your quote from Lykken, I still don't understand the significance of the issue.  I guess first one needs to understand that Lykken is a polygraph advocate, not a detractor.  His objection is to the CQT not the use of the instrument to separate the guilty from the innocent.  These objections stem from the fact that the Government chose the CQT format over his proposed format, a variation of the Guilty Knowledge Test, which he advocates.  So if you want to have a discussion of self-serving statements and misinformation certainly we can start with his book.  This is a statement of my opinion only.  After all Lykken concludes by saying he doesn't have a problem with lying to criminal suspects generally, just in telling some lies.  Certainly an interesting ethical deliniation.

Sorry I didn't get to your previous post earlier, but I'll address it now.  George I don't care whether you or anyone else on this site believes anything I write.  As I previously acknowledged I will not alay the suspicions of the doubters, no matter what I write, so its not an issue worth debating.

I see where the confusion comes in regarding my e-mail with Dr Barland and I gratefully accept your apology.  I originally learned of your site and your download sometime late last year or early this year.  I had read both your download and Williams' book, along with several others prior to my recent meeting with Dr Barland.  While I perused your site, Stoppolygraph, Nopolygraph, and Williams' site occasionally I didn't spend time studying in detail the threads, posts, and alerts.  I basically scanned them for anything that caught my eye and to see if any of my prospective examinees appeared to be posting.  Dr Barland's recent suggestion to me, when we met at DoDPI, was to take a more active interest and to re-read and study your download in detail, which I did.  That is what I was alluding to in the message.

Also you may rest assured that I, like many other examiners, are in frequent contact with DoDPI.  You may also rest assured that any confirmed or suspected countermeasure polygraph examinations are provided to them, from my agency at least.  In fact I have four more that I will be forwarding today, three from your site and one from Williams'.  These three are part of the 17 I mentioned earlier.

I also acknowledge that you clearly state the purpose for making your download available, I'm not suggesting that you are intentionally trying to help criminals defeat the polygraph.  In fact I have noticed that you frequently avoid interacting with criminals, who post here.  Certainly that is evidence to me that your expression of intent is true.  Of course since it is available to anyone with a computer and internet service you can't regulate those who would use it for other than what you intend.  I'm not really clear on what you are writing here though.  Are you stating that it is your belief that countermeasures will not help guilty people defeat the polygraph and your only intent is to ensure that innocent people pass by augmenting their naturally occuring responses?  I also noted that you mentioned in an earlier post that some countermeasures may be counterproductive to helping those innocent people.  I certainly agree with that and I commend you for your candor.  As Dr Barland noted in the "To those who have tried countermeasures" thread, there are risks.  Certainly neither you nor I want to have an innocent person countermeasuring their way into a false positive.  I can see where it might be argued that you have a vested interest in raising the rate of field false positives, but I don't believe that is what you are trying to do.  Though I disagree with your basic premise that innocent people need to augment their responses in order to pass a polygraph, I acknowledge that you believe it and your stated intent is genuine, in my opinion.

I note too, that you frequently mention the Honts studies in this thread and others.  As I stated I'm not qualified to enter into a debate on the research, although I again would like to point out that the Amicus brief I referenced earlier references numerous peer reviewed studies which support the reliability and validity of the CQT.  I read a thread on this site in the policy forum where someone is preparing to discuss those studies with you.  I'll certainly follow that thread with interest.  I'm also glad you acknowledge that the implementation of countermeasures is not easy and requires extensive study and practice. 

As a final note to this post, Wannabe has been addressing the question I asked him here in another thread.  I want to ensure that everyone following this thread was aware of that.  He has stated that he visits other polygraph websites, both pro and con to collect the information, which he used to form his opinion.  While I disagree with his conclusion, I commend him for his dilligence in researching the topic.  This is an important issue to the discussion in this thread.  I want to again encourage anyone who is contemplating using the information from this or any other website in an important life decision to go to the source of that information and review it for themselves and not rely on someones else's interpretation and summary of that information.

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.