NCJ Number
81016
Journal
Polygraph Volume: 10 Issue: 2 Dated: (June 1981) Pages: 92-105
Date Published
1981
Length
14 pages
Annotation
This study focuses on clinicians' interpretations of polygraph protocols and shows that clinicians perform less accurately than statistical analyses.
Abstract
Statistics outperformed human judges because they used information optimally and applied decision rules consistently, while clinicians tended to add error variance to their protocol interpretations. Unfortunately, current empirical evidence suggests that the prospects for improving clinicians' consistencies are not very promising: the authors therefore recommend the possibility of applying statistical methods to interpreting polygraph data. They conclude by suggesting that psychologists become more active researchers in this area of investigation, a research domain that is perperly within their scientific purview. (Author abstract)