investigative -- serious kinds of questions, largely an interrogatory form of the elements of the crime, which I'll bring up again. I think that polygraph examiners, by and large -- some of the best are examples of people who are very skilled interviewers, investigators, interrogators, and so forth -- that in polygraph, examiners at large, in the [unclear], are paramount. They sit in a polygraph suite largely not doing any investigation, and yet they ask these kinds of questions for these kinds of matters. Paired with relevant questions again are control questions. The control question for that would be -- a paired control question might be, "Prior to the age of eighteen did you ever steal something from someone? Did you ever steal something from someone who trusted you?" or, "Prior to 1995, did you ever steal something?" You have the ability with Control Question Tests to time-bar certain things and add certain distinctions in time. In fact, that's a positive thing. Now, the theory, again, that polygraph people generally will talk about in terms of a mechanism for how this works is fear of detection. And the notion is that a guilty person will be more concerned with relevant questions and properly-set control questions will be of more concern to innocent people and that they will be concerned about possible deception, or being concerned that they may be telling a lie to these various things. Now, I think the competing, and perhaps a better, explanation of what's going on is fear of consequences. What I mean by this is, if I were to ask you, "Did you rob the bank on the corner of First and Main? (in fact, it hasn't been robbed, but if I asked you, you haven't robbed it?)." Well, when you answer that question and you answer the paired control question, what you're going to be concerned about is not the fact that you're going to be telling the truth to that relevant issue, but you are going to be concerned about that relevant question, because you're going to be concerned about the consequences. And the consequences are, if in fact you're found to be deceptive on that polygraph exam, that you're going to be subject to
investigative -- serious kinds of questions, largely an interrogatory form of the elements of the crime, which I'll bring up again. I think that polygraph examiners, by and large -- some of the best are examples of people who are very skilled interviewers, investigators, interrogators, and so forth -- that in polygraph, examiners at large, in the [unclear], are paramount. They sit in a polygraph suite largely not doing any investigation, and yet they ask these kinds of questions for these kinds of matters. Paired with relevant questions again are control questions. The control question for that would be -- a paired control question might be, "Prior to the age of eighteen did you ever steal something from someone? Did you ever steal something from someone who trusted you?" or, "Prior to 1995, did you ever steal something?" You have the ability with Control Question Tests to time-bar certain things and add certain distinctions in time. In fact, that's a positive thing. Now, the theory, again, that polygraph people generally will talk about in terms of a mechanism for how this works is fear of detection. And the notion is that a guilty person will be more concerned with relevant questions and properly-set control questions will be of more concern to innocent people and that they will be concerned about possible deception, or being concerned that they may be telling a lie to these various things. Now, I think the competing, and perhaps a better, explanation of what's going on is fear of consequences. What I mean by this is, if I were to ask you, "Did you rob the bank on the corner of First and Main? (in fact, it hasn't been robbed, but if I asked you, you haven't robbed it?)." Well, when you answer that question and you answer the paired control question, what you're going to be concerned about is not the fact that you're going to be telling the truth to that relevant issue, but you are going to be concerned about that relevant question, because you're going to be concerned about the consequences. And the consequences are, if in fact you're found to be deceptive on that polygraph exam, that you're going to be subject to
2014_THE_LIE_DETECTOR_IS_BULL51372.docx