Polygraph

[Seahawks398]

I have been reading this site and have begun to understand the CM used. For instance...

Control questions: Is your name ( )?
Do you live in ( ) ?

Relevant questions:
Have you ever sold drugs?
Have you ever stole anything worth more then $300?

Is this correct?

Is this what is used on pre police polygraphs?

What I don't get is what CM's are to be used. I looked at this site but it is confusing because everyone has an opinion. TM Cullen or George, if you could put this is lame terms for me. What do I do when they ask me the control questions?

Pucker my butt? Bite my tongue? Count math numbers in my head?

Please help! 8-)

[pailryder]

seahawks

Have you considered telling the truth?

[Seahawks398]

You must be one of those worthless losers called a polygrapher.

[T.M. Cullen]

Read "The Lie Behind The Lie Detector"

https://antipolygraph.org/lie-behind-the-lie-detector.pdf

There is an entire section in it about countermeasures.  But read the whole thing and you will see that simply "telling the truth" is NOT a guarantee of passing a polygraph.  

Are you going to be taking one in the future?  Under what circumstances?  Is it a criminal polygraph given by police?  A private polygraph taken at the request or an employer?   Either way, such polygraphs are VOLUNTARY, you don't even have to take them. Don't go chomping at the bit to employ CMs when you can decline their request to take the polycrap test.


TC

[Seahawks398]

It would be for police employment.

[T.M. Cullen]

Then read the LBTLD, as you have no recourse but to take the it or change career paths.

Main point, polygraph is nothing more than an interrogation (fishing expedition for employment polygraphs).  They try to CONVINCE you  the machine can actually detect deception on your part.  THEN, falsely claim that one or more of the test questions indicates YOU ARE LYING, or holding back.  All a ploy to see what they can get you to say.  

So, if you go in KNOWING (without any doubt) the machine CAN NOT detect lies, and they are just trying to bluff you and see what they can "get you to say",  then you will be one step ahead of most other applicants.  Most people believe in the myth of the polygraph, and fall for their little game.  So when told by the examiner they are "showing deception" on this or that question, THEY ACTUALLY BELIEVE IT, and start yacking like an old church lady.  It is amazing what they can get people to admit to.  

Of course, you don't want the examiner to know you are savvy tot all this.   You can't beat a "con" game, if the conman knows you are aware of the "con".   So on one level, it's letting the examiner think he/she has "flustered" you, but not giving up anything that would "raise an eyebrow".  And all it has to do is "raise an eyebrow".   Doesn't have to be a crime...etc.  One should ask themselves "Would I want the hiring authority to hear this?"  Don't admit to anything you haven't already disclosed on the security application!!  And the info requested on your application is quite specific and above certain thresholds.  Have you taken drugs in the past XXX months?  Have you committed any major crimes?   Not very ambiguous, is it?

Of course, there is still the squiggly marks on the chart that must meet their established parameters.    Most people focus most of their worry and attention on what the machine is saying, and trying to make it say "something else".  They totally stop paying attention to the stupid dumb ass shit they are admitting to the examiner!   Again, usually because they actually believe the machine, NOT THEMSELVES!


Of course, if you take drugs, have committed crimes in the recent past, download kiddie porn, lied like a politician on your application, spend your time off in airport restroom stalls tapping your feet...etc., you should admit to it.  But then why would you apply to a LE job?  

Good Luck

TC

[pailryder]

Mr Cullen

Despite your advice to seahawks, you wouldn't hire an attorney that you knew cheated on his bar exam or a physican who cheated on his medical boards or fly with a pilot who cheated to pass FAA licensing.  But you encourage LEA applicants to cheat their prospective departments screening procedures and see that as a good thing.  

[T.M. Cullen]

But you encourage LEA applicants to cheat their prospective departments screening procedures and see that as a good thing.

How can you cheat on an interrogation?  If you answer ALL relevant questions truthfully, just refuse to accept the examiner's false claim that you are lying based on machine readings, how is that "cheating"?

you wouldn't hire an attorney that you knew cheated on his bar exam or a physican who cheated on his medical boards or fly with a pilot who cheated to pass FAA licensing.

Comparing a polygraph ?test? to a bar exam or FAA licensing, or Medical Board has been done here before by polygraphers, and is patently absurd.  For starters, those tests exam a person's knowledge and skill at performing a VALID AND PROVEN function.  Doctors heal, pilots fly a plane, lawyers practice law.  Polygraph operators DO NOT DETECT DECEPTION on the part of job applicants.  In fact, they routine brand truthful applicants as deceptive.

However, if a would be pilot passes his FAA test, passes his flight test it IS a safe presume the person can fly a plane and operate within FAA guidlelines.

To answer your question even more directly.  I wouldn't hire a person for a position requiring honesty based on the results of a polygraph under any circumstances.  Or based on the "vibes" picked up by a so-called psychic, for that matter.

TC

[pailryder]

However you spin it, TC, cheating is still cheating, amd you condone it.

[BBuxton]

Quote:
you wouldn't hire an attorney that you knew cheated on his bar exam or a physican who cheated on his medical boards or fly with a pilot who cheated to pass FAA licensing.

Comparing a polygraph ?test? to a bar exam or FAA licensing, or Medical Board has been done here before by polygraphers, and is patently absurd.For starters, those tests exam a person's knowledge and skill at performing a VALID AND PROVEN function.Doctors heal, pilots fly a plane, lawyers practice law.

TmC your comparison misses the mark. It's true Drs Heal, and Pilots fly Planes, but the people who administer FAA exams don't necessarily fly and the people who give the Bar exam don't necessarily practice law.  But the people you encourage to cheat on a lie detector, if they are successful, will be carrying guns, stopping your wife on a darkened highway late at night,  and swearing to tell the truth in court.   If they can't be trusted not to cheat on a lie detector, How can you trust them not to fake evidence and lie in court?

[Twoblock]

BBuxton and Pailryder

You don't think some who pass the poly does this. Take your head out of the sand and smell the aardvarks.

[George W. Maschke]

While applicants for positions of public trust have an ethical duty to answer relevant questions truthfully, I see no ethical problem with otherwise truthful persons employing polygraph countermeasures to protect against the risk of a false positive outcome. Polygraphy is a pseudoscientific fraud that depends on the polygrapher lying to and otherwise deceiving the person being "tested."

When polygraphers wax indignant about polygraph countermeasures, I am reminded of the old German proverb, "When the fox preaches, guard your geese."

[T.M. Cullen]

However you spin it, TC, cheating is still cheating, amd you condone it.

You still haven't explained how what I've suggested is cheating.  And, in particular,  similar to cheating on a bar exam, medical exam or FAA exam.  Forgetting for the moment, the logical absurdity of comparing taking a polygraph to taking a bar exam, FAA exam, or medical board exam.
You've already admitted elsewhere that the polygraph is really not a test anyway, but an interrogation.  If you truthfully answer relevant questions  posed by the polygraph interrogator how is that cheating?

Speaking of ethics, do you consider telling the interrogee the machine "detects deception" when it doesn't a "lie".   And polygraphers do this.  The phrase "deception indicated" is standard.  Do you have an ETHICAL problem with that?  And of course, having the subject of the polygraph believe that lie is crucial to the success of the polygraph.  IOW, the polygraph is "based on a lie".  What say ye about that?

My position is that cheating on a bogus test, which ain't really a test, is a bit of an oxymoron.   Oh, and not falling for used car salesman sales "tricks"  isn't cheating either.



TC

[BBuxton]

TMC and George.  It looks like you're saying that it is ok to lie or cheat as long as YOU think its OK.

If I fill out a police application and lie about a previous job that should have abolutely no effect on my ability to be a cop, should they be able to fire me if they find out.

Isn't fudging on your application just another countermeasure to keep the FBI from drawing a bad impression from a boss who never liked you anyway?  I mean what business is it of theirs that I was fired from a job I held for 3 years because the boss found out I had slept with his wife.

What about someone who is trying to infiltrate law enforcement for criminal reasons.Do you think it is OK/Ethical for them to use these countermeasures to monkey with the lie detctor to create a false negative?

[pailryder]

TC

The applicant is not cheating me, I'm only the polygraph examiner.  They ARE  cheating the department, the other applicants, and the public they say they seek to serve.