The Myth Behind the Polygraph Test
Throughout history there has been many ways to try to determine if someone is lying or telling the truth being questioned for criminal offences. A few examples of tests that were used in the past before the polygraph test was invented include the rice test and the dunking test (Scott O. Lilienfeld, Steven Jay Lynn, John Ruscio, Barry L. Beyerstein, 2010). The rice test was used by the ancient Hindus and the idea of it was that deception leads to fear and fear leads to an increase of saliva produced. In this test the accused subject would not be able to spit out rice that was chewed because the increased amount of saliva would make the rice stick to the sides of the gums (Scott O. Lilienfeld, et al. 2010). …show more content…
Lilienfeld, et al. 2010). In the 1920's the first polygraph test which is more commonly known as the lie detector test was invented (Scott O. Lilienfeld, et al. 2010). This test was invented by a psychologist named William Moulton Marston (Scott O. Lilienfeld, et al. 2010). This test worked by measuring a person's systolic blood pressure as they were being interrogated for a crime that was committed that they were a suspect for (Scott O. Lilienfeld, et al. 2010). This lie detector test was thought to be unfillable but now we know …show more content…
It now provides a chart that measures a continuous record of a person's psychological activity on a chart (Scott O. Lilienfeld, et al. 2010). To measure a person's psychological activity the polygraph test provides information about the subject's skin conductance, blood pressure, and respiration activity (Scott O. Lilienfeld, et al. 2010). Having a measure of a person's psychological activity while being questions proves to be helpful because offers clues about how anxious the person is during questioning (Scott O. Lilienfeld, et al. 2010). All of the information that is plotted on the chart is interpreted by a polygraph examiner. Sometime this is a problem because the examiner has information about the case and will sometimes have an opinion formed before the test even begins on if the person is guilty or innocent and this along with some other situations can lead to a lot of false positives on the test (Scott O. Lilienfeld, et al. 2010).
There are several different formats used with the polygraph tests. The most popular one is used when investigating for specific crimes is called the comparison question test also known as the CQT (Scott O. Lilienfeld, et al. 2010). With this format questions are asked about the crime but there are also questions that are completely irrelevant to the crime to try to make the person lie so that a base line is provided to make it easier for the examiner to be able to interpret
Throughout history there has been many ways to try to determine if someone is lying or telling the truth being questioned for criminal offences. A few examples of tests that were used in the past before the polygraph test was invented include the rice test and the dunking test (Scott O. Lilienfeld, Steven Jay Lynn, John Ruscio, Barry L. Beyerstein, 2010). The rice test was used by the ancient Hindus and the idea of it was that deception leads to fear and fear leads to an increase of saliva produced. In this test the accused subject would not be able to spit out rice that was chewed because the increased amount of saliva would make the rice stick to the sides of the gums (Scott O. Lilienfeld, et al. 2010). …show more content…
Lilienfeld, et al. 2010). In the 1920's the first polygraph test which is more commonly known as the lie detector test was invented (Scott O. Lilienfeld, et al. 2010). This test was invented by a psychologist named William Moulton Marston (Scott O. Lilienfeld, et al. 2010). This test worked by measuring a person's systolic blood pressure as they were being interrogated for a crime that was committed that they were a suspect for (Scott O. Lilienfeld, et al. 2010). This lie detector test was thought to be unfillable but now we know …show more content…
It now provides a chart that measures a continuous record of a person's psychological activity on a chart (Scott O. Lilienfeld, et al. 2010). To measure a person's psychological activity the polygraph test provides information about the subject's skin conductance, blood pressure, and respiration activity (Scott O. Lilienfeld, et al. 2010). Having a measure of a person's psychological activity while being questions proves to be helpful because offers clues about how anxious the person is during questioning (Scott O. Lilienfeld, et al. 2010). All of the information that is plotted on the chart is interpreted by a polygraph examiner. Sometime this is a problem because the examiner has information about the case and will sometimes have an opinion formed before the test even begins on if the person is guilty or innocent and this along with some other situations can lead to a lot of false positives on the test (Scott O. Lilienfeld, et al. 2010).
There are several different formats used with the polygraph tests. The most popular one is used when investigating for specific crimes is called the comparison question test also known as the CQT (Scott O. Lilienfeld, et al. 2010). With this format questions are asked about the crime but there are also questions that are completely irrelevant to the crime to try to make the person lie so that a base line is provided to make it easier for the examiner to be able to interpret