polygraph question

[777]

In the middle of my test my examiner just stopped and said the test is over, removed the equipment and said you can leave now.  wtf!  He accused me of breathing so slow that i should be clinically dead.  He said i need to be at a breath rate of 14-20 or he cannot administer the test.  If i breath that fast i get light headed and sick.  what do i do now?  I was not even trying to breath slow or do anything else to manipulate the chart.

[George W. Maschke]

Polygraphers expect subjects to breath at a rate of about 15-30 breaths (in and out) per minute. When a subject breathes more slowly than that, they often assume that the subject is attempting to manipulate the result. I had an experience similar to yours some years ago with an LAPD polygrapher who angrily accused me of using polygraph countermeasures (at the time I didn't even know what they were).

For information on how to pass a polygraph "test," see Chapters 3 & 4 of The Lie Behind the Lie Detector.

[777]

Yes he angrily left the room.  He also left for awhile while i was still attatched to the machine.  My rate did not change.  Also inbetween some of the questioning he had removed all the insturmentation except the breath measuring tubes and my rate did not change.  I pysically cannot sit in a chair and breath at that rate without getting sick.  In order to breath that hard I need to be jogging or doing some form of exercise.  I have checked with some medical people and they said to abnormally try to keep my respriatory rate that low I would have been symptematic.  They said if i breath that slow without turning blue in a few minutesthat is just the norm for me.  I had the tubes on my chest for at least 15 minutes and felt normal.  I know I also have extremely low blood pressure while at rest.  How do I pass the test if I get another chance?  Also what is the 170?

[George W. Maschke]

If you get another shot at the polygraph, you might try breathing faster (within the range expected by polygraphers) by taking shallower breaths. But there's more to passing a polygraph than just breathing at the expected rate, as you'll see in the chapters of The Lie Behind the Lie Detector that I mentioned.

Nunyun's comment about "the 170" (since deleted) was directed to me, and refers to a matter he and I have discussed off-line.

[777]

I have read the online book about passing the polygraph.  The experience went almost exactly as the book said, even including some of the questions.  But I could not differentiate from control and real questions.  The easy ones were the irrelevant.  He used a control lie initially before we started in on the real part of the test.  I decided not to do anything since i was not sure of what questions were what.  I am hoping it is just a bluff to try to get me to make some kind of a confession the next time.  I think I was just really not reacting to any of the questions much at all so there was nothing to differentiate between them.

[George W. Maschke]

I, too, hoped my LAPD polygrapher's theatrical performance might be a bluff, but that was not the case. If your polygraph was for a law enforcement agency, then in all likelihood, your polygrapher was not bluffing when he terminated the "test."

If, on the other hand, your polygraph was associated with an application for employment with the CIA or NSA, then it is much more plausible that he might have been bluffing. Applicants for these agencies are routinely subjected to multiple pre-employment polygraph sessions. Indeed, it seems that no one "passes" on the first round.