He is correct, often times the lie detector test is used to play mind games with the subject.
I had a long 3 hour conversation with a retired lie detector operative for a major NJ Police department once. The guy was even on 60 minutes back in his prime.
Anyhow, after listening to him about the test, I feel quite differently about them....
Didn’t realize it was a crime to talk about it though, that is wrong. Simply invalidates the subject, imho.
You are correct. . .and the science says it is a mess and not accurate: http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=10420. . .and
http://www8.nationalacademies.org/onpinews/newsitem.aspx?RecordID=10420
https://antipolygraph.org/nas.shtml
The poly is not accurate by any measure.
I know a guy who was molested as a child by an older boy.
He applies for a government job and gets polygraphed. They ask him if he’s had sex with a man. He thinks for a minute and says to himself ‘He wasn’t a man. There was no penetration, so it wasn’t sex, and in any case I didn’t consent.” So he says “No.” The polygraph says he’s lying.
So he explains the whole situation and asks if they can do it again. They do the whole test over again, and when they get to the sex with a man question he says yes. The polygraph says he’s lying.
He told me that the polygraph couldn’t tell if he was lying. It could only tell if he was nervous, and thinking back on that event 15 years later still made him nervous no matter what he said.
He didn’t get the job.