Why do departments still use the polygraph for hiring when it’s been proven time and time again to not be accurate?
Why do departments still use the polygraph for hiring when it’s been proven time and time again to not be accurate?
r/AskLE
Why do departments still use the polygraph for hiring when it’s been proven time and time again to not be accurate?
Comments
Polygraph by itself is a dumb magic box. The threat, for lack of better word, of a polygraph though has a way of making people reveal things they may have lied about or concealed and a good polygrapher who’s done it for a while is it’s own lie detector.
To “weed-eat”, weed out undesireables
We still use it, but a failure by itself is not enough for us to exclude someone. However, you wouldn’t believe the things people have admitted to before, during, and after the polygraph.
To get people to admit to things they otherwise wouldn’t. It’s just a scare tactic and it works for that purpose. It can’t tell that you’re lying, it’s only useful for measuring physiological responses (BP, heart rate, respiration, etc.) that they claim are associated with deception.
Get folks to admit to dumb shot they did that PD would otherwise not discover.
It’s garbage.
My state it’s illegal for employers to use polygraphs for hiring.
Polygraphs are bogus and should be illegal. Occasionally a subject will reveal during an examination that they lied during part of their application questionnaires or interviews. In my opinion they disqualify more good applicants than filter out the bad.
Here’s the reason why that no one is talking about. Polygraph examiners and departments with an examiner make money from them. If employed for a department, they can examine applicants for other departments for a fee. Private polygraph examiners are almost always retired cops with local connections who did it for a local department before. They typically charge $500-1000 for a few hours of work.
The closer you look at polygraphs and examiners, the more it starts to look like a lie, a scam, an unethical business and way to disqualify otherwise qualified candidates if no other reason exists.