The ‘control’ question ‘test’ (CQT) polygrapher's dilemma: logico-ethical considerations for psychophysiological practitioners and researchers

The so-called ‘control’ question ‘test’ (CQT) has been criticized on methodological and ethical grounds by psychophysiologist. The ethical analyses have focussed on the possibility that the CQT's interrogative features may elicit false confessions, but an empirical problem is that the rate of these false confessions is difficult to establish. In this conceptual note, this author raises a logico-ethical problem for the CQT, called the Polygrapher's Dilemma (PD). The two horns of the PD are to damage the innocent examinee classified as deceptive and damage to those examinees' psychological well being who are classified as non-deceptive to the relevant questions and who are not even debriefed concerning their feelings of unease about issues raised by the comparison, so-called ‘control’ questions. Although there may be arguments about which of the PD's two horns are more serious, there is no doubt that both are, in an absolute sense, ethically negative. Nor is there an ethically justifiable third alternative available. It is also contended that not only practitioners but also researchers (who use the CQT in laboratory, ‘mock-crime’ situations) are affected by PD. Finally, it is noted that PD exist only for the CQT procedure and not for the more standardized and scientifically based Guilty Knowledge Technique.