Approved For Release 2001 /0VRLaielA-RDP96-00291 R000200240001-0 11 * They decided to stop the experiment for the day but asked Price to look at the target at different intervals that evening. (Due to the difference in time, all of his viewing during this formalized part of the experiment - on this first day - had been at nighttime locally at URDF-3). Price said he was beginning to labor anyway and, “if you start laboring at it, you start mocking-up things." He was then reminded that he was going to draw a perimeter, or would he rather save that for tomorrow. He said he would rather save that since he's starting tu labor a bit. It was unfortunate that they didn't pursue the perimeter earlier in the day because it certainly has a unique shape. They quit at 3 p.m. ; Summary of the First Day The controlled session taped at SRI lasted a total of about 1 hour and 52 minutes... It consisted of the experimenters defining the target as a "real target" as opposed to a sample target. Withtheuse of several maps, Pat Price was given coordinates of the target and told that il was a scientific military research and test area about 25 to 30 miles SW of the Irtysh River. When the coordinates were given, Price immediately biased his thinking that this area was related to the Soviets' space-launching and recov- ery areas. Since this is not true, he may have inadvertantly and unknowingly biased himself into an incorrect target relationship. Price described the target as a military and scientific complex about 30 miles SW of the Irtysh River but there is nothing in this description that wasn't already given to him. He then gives what is almost a perfect de- scription of someone's first Took at the Operations Area of URDF-3. He describes it as low one-story buildings that are partially dug into the ground giving the effect (as seen at ground level) of very short, squatty buildings, whereas they a are actually fairly roomy on the inside. Unfortunately, as he later describes the specifics of buildings in the scientific complex, he never again mentions . earth-covering of partially-buried buildings.. It seemed he had the perfect description of URDF-3, but never came back to that again. In fact, his later ° 1” Approved For Release 2001/03/07 : CIA-RDP96-00794R000200240001-0 a Nie pl Sage ah ai sec i TE COEPET TD oR ereat are aPC aE
Approved For Relgase 2001/087=23S44R DP96 -0Q791R000200240001-0 - 12 description of the most dominant building (a large three-story building) doesn't match any building at URDF-3. Price tends to get bogged down in specifics and then says something like, "I'I1 come back to that," but seldom does. He said the military complex looks like it's been there for two to three years when in fact it's been there for over a decade. At one point when describing the specifics of the "radar/ communications building,” he demonstrates that he could possibly be led to see what the experimenter wants him to see. . He sees some landmark-type items that simply don't appear at or near URDF-3. They are: ’ ‘ 1) the road from the river to the target area passes through a gorge, 2) a 500-ft. tall antenna, 3) an outdoor pool (60' x 150'), 4) an array of telephone poles surrounded dy trees about 500 yards ‘SE of the scientific complex, 5) an airstrip on a plateau 12 miles NW of URDF-3, 6). a smal? village NE of URDF-3, | 7) a city 60 miles SW of URDF-3, 8) a cluster of pine trees west of URDF-3, and 9) a three-story building (with a basement) as the dominant building in the scientific complex. It doesn't seem fair to grade him on landmark-type objects ne failed to see at the target because his attention may not have been directed on them. However, it does seem fair to question the existence of those objecvs he claims to have seen. The niost positive evidence of valid remote viewing fur the first day (1 hour and 52 minutes) was his initial view of the ‘target as “low-one-story build- ings that are partially dug into the ground..." Unfortunately, he never con- _ sidered that description again. The only other piece of positive evidence that day was APPKAVEd Far ReleasersQ01/03/Ada1 CIA-RDR96-00791R000200240001-0 . SONFEDENTIAL . ra oo:
Approved For Rejgase 2001/05/07 CiRRDP96-00781 R000200240004.p ~  S$G1J To summarize the first day's session, Price accurately described the location and type of target (but that was given) but failed on the layout and type of buildings. He tended to spend too much time on specifics only to say, "I'll come back to that," but seldom did. He successfully evaded drawing a perimeter of the area even though he was asked to do this twice. This was unfortunate because the shape of the perimeter is unique. My conclusion is that nothing positive to validate remote viewing resulted from this first day's session. Additional Contact on the. First Day Hal Puthoff talked to Pat Price by telephone that evening at 5:25 p.m. to give him further instructions for his scanning that night. He was told that there were some specific areas he had mentioned that the experimenters were most interested in. Specifically he was asked "for an exact, as possible, drawing of the crane (that was in the rear of Building 1) and exactly what its relation- | Ship is to Building 1." Further, they wanted to know “anything about Building 1 in relation to the surrounding buildings, like whatever forms of connection or communication or transportation that exists between Building 1 (the main building) and the ones that are nearby." They especially wanted "as much detail as Possible on the gantry crane and its relation to ‘Buitding 1." He was told that the second thing they were most interested in was the security fence around the perimeter. They wanted any detail on that - even a drawing of exactly what the fence looked like. It was ‘emphasized that the crane was really top priority, especially what it looked ‘like in relation to the main building (Building 1). SECOND DAY The remote-viewing experiment resumed at 11 a.m. on July 10, 1974. It was mentioned that the previous night Price had turned in drawings of a fence and a crane. Price's first comments had to do with an observation of the immense size of the gantry crane. He said he didn't realize how large the gantry crane was until he saw a man walking by one of the crane.wheels. Assuming the height of the man as 6 ft., he realized that the dimensional data he had derived the day bé- fore was underestimated by at least a factor of 3. | Approved For Release 2001/03/07 : CIA-RDP96-00794R000200240001-0 ‘ a CONFIDENTIAL Os let : _ . e
Approved For Relgase 200 T0#/0 P61 -RDP96-00Z91R000200240001-0 . . 14 He commented on the security fence as being electrified, but never men- tioned the unique shape of the perimeter fence or the fact that there are really four perimeter fences at URDF-3. Figure 4 is his sketch of a small sec- tion of the fence. rice was again told that the experimeters wanted more information ov exactly what the relationship was between the crane and the major building (Building 1); specifically, how did the crane interact with Building 1 or any- thing surrounding the building. Price said the gantry crane interacted with Building 1, the outdoor pool and the telephone pole array. He drew a sketch showing the relative locations of buildings as he saw them that day (Fig. 5). He said the crane was so heavy that it left tracks in the ground and that, / "the crane tracks go to the building and where this sunken building is." Un- fortunately, the experimenters did not ask him to identify the "sunken building." This was important because in reality the gantry crane at URDF-3 operates on rails over a sunken building (designated as Building } by NPIC). As Price continued to look at the area, he said, "I'm seeing a lot of things today I didn't see yesterday... I can see some very heavy... looks like railroad track, but they're spread much too wide so it looks like a riding gan- try." That description compares quite closely with one of the most distinctive observables at URDF-3 - the gantry crane that operates on rails over the three- story underground building (Building 1 at URDF-3). However, his description of the interaction between the crane and Building 1 is incorrect. He describes two gantry cranes that enter into his above-ground Building 1 whereas the single gantry crane at URDF-3 operates on rails above the underground Building 1. His description of this building is also wrong in several respects as compared to the actual Building 1 at URDF-3. The major dif- ference is that Building 1 at URDF-3 is an underground building rather than above ground as Price described it. He was asked, "Are there any windows in the build- ing at all?" At this time, he realizes for the first time that the building is actually five-stories tall rather than three-stories as he had originally thought. He saw windows on the second, third and fourth stories on the north side of the © building and said there were no windows on the other three sides. The session Approved For Release 2001/03/07 : CIA-RDP96-00794R000200240001-0 a
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Approved For Rejease 200998707" CIA-RDP96-00791 R000200249901-0 + Assuming the relationship of the gantry crane to Buiiding 1 in Fig. 6 is the same as the relationship of the gantry crane to Building 1 at URDF-3, it must be concluded that Price is oriented 90° in error in the scien- tific complex. His north direction for the scientific complex only would cor- respond to what is actually east at URDF-3. His relationship of scientific complex to military complex to the Irtysh River is stil] correct though. | Unfortunately, the experimenters failed again to get a drawing of the perimeter fence for the scientific comptex. In Fig. 5, I have taken the liberty of drawing a perimeter fence around the scientific complex and come very close to the actual shape of the perimeter fence of the Operations Area (scientific complex) at URDF-3. Price had been asked twice the day before to draw a perimeter of the area, but. it wasn't followed up by the experimenters. Summary of the Second Day The controlled session at SRI lasted for one hour (11 a.m. until noon). The rest of the session was conducted over the telephone with only the voice of the experimenter recorded on tape. Price commented that he was see- ing a lot of things that he hadn't seen the previous day and supplied the most positive evidence yet for remote viewing with his sketchof the rail-mounted gantry crane. It seems inconceivable to imagine how he could draw such @ like- ness to tne actual crane at URDF-3 unless: , 1) he actually saw it. through remote viewing, or 2) he was informed of what to draw by someone knowledgeable of URDF-3. I only mention this second possibility because the experiment was not controlled to discount the possibility that Price could talk to other people - such as the Disinformation Section of the KGB. That may sound ridiculous to the reader, but I have to consider all] possibilities in the spectrum from his being capable to view remotely to his being supplied data for disinformation purposes by the KGB, Discounting item 2 for the time being, because it seems distasteful ° and unpopular, Price did much better the second day toward establishing his Approved For Release 2001/03/07 : CIA-RDP96-00791R000200240001-0 a . y «ae - +e - . . “eg tn we at cd . sf at oe te . eant . we so . * bd and Tha . . oJ ee se -~ . ” . £ _ a 7 ry . _ _ a _ , fF t - an 2 fo anced fr Ae aD na mR te oe ea
~GOREIDENTEAL.. Approved For Rejease 2001/03/07 : CIA-RDP96-0Q#91 R000200240001-0 2 ~ credibility in remote viewing. Unfortunately, the experimenters did not follow up on a couple of key items - a sketch of the perimeter of the scientific complex, and pursuing the "sunken building" comment that Price made. After studying only. his sketch of the gantry crane, it's easy to believe that he can view remotely. I can understand how he might not see some landmark-type objects (like the four headframes) but I find it difficult to understand the other landmark-type ob- jects he sees that simply do not exist at URDF-3, like his incorrect description of Building 1. One explanation could be that if Price mentions enough specific objects (such as three different types of gantry cranes when there js really only one), he will surely hit on one object that is actually present. If the user of Price's remote-viewing talents had no way of checking, how could he differentiate the fact from the fiction? At this stage of the experiment, the data is incon- clusive to validate Price's capability of remote viewing. THIRD DAY Summary jhe experiment began again at 11:43 a.m. on duly 11, 1974. The data included 67 pages of transcribed tapes along with & sketches drawn that day by Pat Price. It was difficult to follow the discussion of Price and the experimenters when they were obviously looking at a sketch and saying things like, "What about this object over here?" I had no way of guessing which object and at which location and on which sketch. The experiment started with Price describing the specifics of the pool. At one time during this discussion I thought the pool he was looking at might well be the underground building (Building 1) at URDF-3. He incorrectly recalled the nearest railroad as being 300 miles to the north even though on the first day, he had said’ the closest railroad was about 60 miles north. During the early afternoon, the experimenters showed Price a sketch of a perspective of the southern part of the Operations Area at URDF-3 (see Fig. 11). The sketch included the rail-mounted gantry crane, the underground building (Building 1), the partially earth-covered tank, Building 4, and the four headframes. Approved For Release 2001/03/07 : CIA-RDP96-00794R000200240001 -0 + _*- nd bal
Approved For Release 2001/03/07 : CIA-RDP96-0Q391 R000200240001-0 ~ They told him that this was a sketch of a perspective of the actual place and asked him whether he could now "see" the four headframes as shown in the sketch. He said he recognized the area as the one he had been seeing but claimed that only one of the four headframes was present now. That proved to be untrue, since all four headframes are still there. As seen in Fig. 11, the sketch of Building 1 is deceiving in that it looks like there are really four buildings (A, B, C, and D as marked in Fig. 11) sitting atop a concrete slab rather than there being a 50-ft. deep under- ground building with four sections (A, B, C, and D) extending above the ground. Price "looked" into the four “separate” buildings (A, B, C, and D) and described their contents in great detail but never suggested that this was all one large underground building. Finally, much later in the afternoon, it was requested that he investigate whether "Buildings A, B, C, and D" were really the surface elements of an underground building. He looked underground and said, "No, that's a concrete apron, and there's nothing subterranean right in that particular area." This description is the most negative evidence yet and tends to discredit Price's ability to remotely view URDF-3. FOURTH DAY Summary. The discussion on the fourth day (July 15, 1974) invoived only Hal Puthoff and Pat Price. Price was very specific regarding his concept of the overall operation at URDF-3. He recognized that from the beginning, he had been trying to force-fit a space-oriented situation to the target location, but now realized this "feeling" was incorrect. . This day, the discussions did nothing toward supplying any new evidence (that could be cHécked) to establish validity for Price's remote~ viewing capability. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS * The experiment to determine the validity of Pat Price's remote viewing of URDF-3 appears to be a failure. He described a scientific and military complex about 30 miles SW of the Irtysh River, but this information Approved For Release 2001/03/07 : CIA-RDP96-00794R000200240001-0 tf co. 0 CURE Eas, ole 7 * ’ et
Approved For Rejease 2060080 “ETA -RDP96-09791R000200240001-0 . 28 had been given to him earlier. He got very specific about details only to sum- marize with a comment like "I'll come back to that," but seldom did he ever "come back to that." He successfully evaded drawing a perimeter of the area even though he was asked to do this several times throughout the experiment; this was unfortunate because the shape of the perimeter is unique. I can understand how he might not have seen some of the landmark-type objects at URDF-3, but it's difficult to understand how he "saw" the other landmark-type vbjects that simply do not exist at URDF-3. One explanation could be that if he mentioned enough specific items, he would surely hit on one ob- ject that is present which could explain the most positive evidence to support remote viewing for this experiment - a sketch of a rail-mounted gantry crane. He was completely wrong in his description of how this crane was related to any building. Even after he was shown an actual sketch of the scientific complex, he failed to see the underground building (Building 1 at URDF-3) but "saw it" as four separate above-ground buildings sitting atop a concrete apron. _ In trying to determine the validity of this remote-viewing experiment, the worth of the data to the eventual user has to be considered. If the user had no way of checking, how could he differentiate the fact from the fiction? In the case of URDF-3, the only positive evidence of the rail-mounted gantry crane was far outweighed by the large amount of negative evidence noted in the body of this analysis. It's unfortunate that so much of the experiment was done over the phone. If this should happen in the future, both sides of the phene conversation should be recorded rather than just the experimenter's voice, as was done during this experiment. Also, the experimenters did not pursue some important details when they had a chance. This may have been a result of their unfamiliarity with .the target. This was obvious when the experimenters didn’t know which direction was north in the actual perspective of URDF-3. I suggest that in the future, at least one of the experimenters be. totally familiar with the target. I also suggest that future experiments be more tightly controlled to discount the pos-‘ sibility of the subject discussing the material with peopie not involved in the exper improved For Release 2001/03/07 : CIA-RDP96-00791R000200240001-0 Teemeapa es le at
—CORPIDEN SEE Approved For Resease 2001/03/07 : CIA-RDP96-00#91 R00020024000400 After careful analysis of the data presented to me, I consider Price's remote-viewing experiment of URDF-3 to be unsuccessful. I recommend that the tapes be considered for use with the psychological stress evaluator (PSE) de- scribed in Appendix I; I am not competent to judge the reliability of the PSE as an aid to lie detection, but I think the tapes should be subjected to such a test. , . Approved For Release 2001/03/07 : CIA-RDP96-007914R000200240001-0 a . : . 7 . G . » yt ‘ ee. Can . Pc ce cris ot oem et + = oa f . Cr ry : ae ; os
Approved For Reease 200f9SS/07"C1A-RDP96-00791R000200240001-0,, CP¥RGHT . from Setence, Volume 190, No. 4212 Lie Detectors: PSE Gains Audience Despite Critics’ Doubts Ultimately, the PSE coyld affect human communication the way the development of tf APPENDIA I dated October 24, 1975 CPYRGHT atomic bomb affected warfare.—International Moneyline, a newsletter. The above agitated observation reflects the fascination felt in some quarters over a recently developed instrumeni called the psychological stress evaluator, or PSE. The PSE has become the first competi- tion of the polygraph (or lie detector) since the latter was developed in the 1920's. Whereas a polygraph tests a subject's psychophysiological responses to question- ing by measuring his or her respiration, blood pressure, and skin conductivity, the PSE registers stress by measuring certain inaudible modulations in the voice. Be- cause it can be operated simply with the tape recording of a voice, “it is the first lie detector that can be used on a dead man,” notes its inventor, Allan D. Bell. The PSE has been the object of consid- erable attention and controversy and the subject of articles in Playhoy and Pent- house, as well as publications aimed at law enforcement and security personnel. Its re- liability as an aid to lie detection has come under attack—notably jn a study commis- sioned in 1973 by the Army—and Its versa- tility and simplicity have aroysed ethical 24 OCTOBER 1975 concerns because they give it a real edge . over the polygraph when it comes to in- vading privacy. The PSE was introduced a few years ago by Dektor Counterintelligence and Secu- rity, an adventurous little clectronics com- pany run by ex-Army sleuths who believe a man’s reach should cxcced his grace. (Dek: tor was in the news last year, it may b called, for coming up with an ingenious counterexplanation for the 18' :-minute gap in Rose Mary Woods’ tape. See Sci- ence, 22 February 1974 and 21 June 1y74.} The PSE was born in Allan Bell’s base- ment. Bell, a retired Army intelligence of- ficer who quit 5 years ago to form Dektor, says the search for a new way to measure stress was triggered by a market research assignment to come up with a way to measure the emotionality with which people answer questions by pollsters. Bell and the PSE’s coinventors, Charles McQuiston and Bill Ford, set out to seek “identifiable emissions from the human body.’ Odors and voice were the best pros- pects, but odors are so numerous ang eas- ily dispelled or adulterated that they set- tled on the voice. They discovered that all muscles, including those controlling the vocal cords, vibrate slightly when in use, 2 phenomenon that is believed to be an in- voluntary function of the central nervous gystem. This is called the muscle micro- tremor and had already been identified, al- though the inventors didn't } time—“we reinvented the wheel,” says tremor, which is transmitted to vocal cords, is suppressed by activity of the auto- nomic neryous system when the speaker is under stress. It is analogous, and may be directly related, to the suppression of the brain’s alpha waves {which are associated with a relaxed waking state) when a per- son is raaking a conscious effort to think. Tie PSE is more versatile than the poly- pranh because the subject is not required to be hooked up, immobile, to a machine, and, in fact, doesn'1 even need to be pres- ent; the analysis is made from a tape recording. and can be done on a tape made from a telephone conversation or a broad- east. In a lie detection situation the sub- ject is asked the same carefully designed set of questions (innocuous “control” questions interspersed with significant ones) that are asked in a polygraph exam. The tape is then played back through the PSE—a portable affair ensconced in an inconspicuous black sultcase-—at a speed four times slower ihan that at which 4 was recorded, on a moving graph chart plots the stress. if the waveform travels up and down er- fatically, the frequency moduiation of the 385 Approved For Release 2001/03/07 : CIA-RDP96-007941R000200240001-0 and a needle ne ce a py FINRA PSN Re RAG UE A contig Eee Dale a mS a 8h edhe
aye. a2 a0 et | peccpissitist: pps § beges pave eae bebe (bobs ioeee pees fase He Press! Bia fess soest rrestasshiha ee Seale In an unstressed utterance, at left, the overall configuration resembles a wave, produced by the microtremor that oscillates at 8 to 14 cycles a second. The other chari shows heavy stress as the tremor is obliterated. microtremor is being registered. This indi- cates no stress. When the speaker is under stress, however, the tremor is suppressed and tracings become more uniform. Best known of the early PSE experi- ments is Dektor’s run-through of con- testants on the television show “To Tell the Truth.” By taping each person when he said “My name is...,” they claimed 95 percent accuracy in spotting the real John Does. The PSE made its forensic debut in Howard County, Maryland, where a police lieutenant named Michael Kradz, who sub- sequently joined Dektor, reported a num- ber of successes using the PSE, most of which contributed to clearing suspects of offenses ranging from shoplifting to murder, Dektor has sold more than 700 of the in- struments (now priced at $4200), mostly to retail and industrial firms who want to catch sticky-fingered employees, to private investigative firms, and to local Jaw en- forcement agencies. And sales are going up, says Bell, despite cold water thrown on the PSE by a report produced for the Army in 1973. The Department of Defense bought five of the machines and turned three of them over to the Army whose Land Warfare Laboratory paid Joseph Kubis, a psychologist and polygraph re- searcher at Fordham University, $27,500 to conduct a comparative study of the worth of the polygraph, the PSE, and an- other machine similar to the PSE cailed the voice stress analyzer. Kubis, using lab- oratory subjects, gave the polygraph a 76° percent accuracy rating and the PSE 33 percent, or about the same as chance (he did a “triad” study, testing people in three: roles—perpetrator, lookout, and innocent bystander). _ The, Kubis report has gotten a good deal of attention, and is cited by all the PSE's critics. Bell, of course, dismisses the study as a slipshod piece of work and says no other research has. confirmed the Kubis other well-controlled experiment agrees with. his conclusions, and that research with “live” cases, which Dektor favors, yield very poor results. The Army, while declining to give the Kubis report official endorsement, has nonetheless acted on its findings. It allocated one of the machines for use in research not related to lie detec- tion, and “destroyed” the other two, ac- cording to an Army spokesman, who was as emphatic about disassociating the mili- tary from the PSE as if he had been asked about plans to deploy a new nerve gas. The government is clearly in no hurry to attract more attacks on its surveillance habits, and Bell doesn’t mind having this market closed to him, as he thinks ihe gov- emment is a nuisance to do business with anyway and not too bright. Reliability aside, there has been consid- erable concer’ over the potential for un- ethical use of the PSE. The main problem is created by the fact that it can be used without the subject’s knowledge. Robert Smith, formerly of the. American Civil Libertics Union, points out that job inter- views can be taped and run tnrough the in- strument without the person's knowledge and he can be denied employment on the basis of stressed-looking squiggles. He also says that the PSE, again unlike the poly- graph, can be used in conjunction with wiretapping. And, he says, “people's ca- reers can ride on other people gome around analyzing their voice tapes.” That comment is in reference to the fact that some PSE operators and journalists have been having fun analyzing the public utter- ances of various interesting people. Indeed, one free-lance: writers ex-C1A computer specialist George O'Toole, has written a’ whole book explaining why Lee Harvey Oswald didn’t kill anyone—-based in large part on a PSE analysis of Oswald's state- ments after he was captured. (“I didn't shoot anybody, no sir.” said Oswald with no stress.) Other colorful PSE uses have nied ever having heard of Clifford Irving rclaims.to have known before any- EY ROG20R240001-0.0 because their analysis of Hughes’ PSE chart showed him to be sincere). Allan Bell does not suffer moral di- lemmas about any of this. First of all, he emphasizes, anyone who buys a PSE must take a 3-day training course in its use, and if the customer flunks there is no sale, or he can pay for more training until he passes. As for surreptitious use, Bell says that in uncontroiled conditions—such. as taping a presidential press conference or a phone conversation—there is no way of telling whether a person is lying, only whether he is ‘stressing.’ No stress is a reliable in- dicator that a person thinks he is speaking truth, but stress can arise from a variety of causes that can only tc weeded out in a carefully controlled situation. As for broader ethical considerations, Bell an- swers with a question: “Which is immoral —for a person to lie, or for a lie to be un- covered?” Bell suspects that some busi- nessmen have bought the PSE to deter- mine whether associates are squaring with them in business dealings, but that doesn’t bother him—Mektor did the same thing, and canceled a deal because they believed they were being lied to about tlie promised delivery of same money. Least enamored of the PSE is the 1200- member American Polygraph Association (APA), which in 1973 passed a resolution saying none of its members would be al- lowed to operate a PSE unless it were used in conjunction with a polygraph test. Kirk Barefoot of the APA says the PSE quite simply doesn’t meet the organization's standards because a lie-detecting machine should be tuned into a minimum of two physiological responses, and the PSE measures only une. The APA also looks askance at PSE training requirements, as palygraph operators must go to school for 6 weeks followed by a 6-month internship. Dektor counters these objections by attacking the motives of the APA. Bell gays the two instruments are about equally reliable when used by skilled examiners with well-constructed tests: as for train- ing, well, it’s much easier to. use a PSE. Beli savs the obvious reason for APA hostility is that the PSE poses a threat to ihe tight-knit fraternity. of polygraph ., aperators. Many companies would fat- - urally turn to the PSE because it's cheap- er to have an in-house truth specialist, — ‘and it’ costs a Jot to farm oul-an em- alovee for polygraph training. + Dektor went after the law enforcement and security market because that's where” - findings. " oved } f. r 5h watlin spend » . ines. KApproved Por Relewse?200/03/07 CTRORD PSS:O07 STRONY ANN 2ANI DT ei some 360 tu erate tte SCIFNCE, VOL. 190,
CPX.RGHT ~~ proved tare ebecd terse Rell believes, though, that the most interesting uppli- rations of the machine will be in psycno- logical research, diagnosis, and testing. The PSE can do several other things the polygraph can't. it can chart whole sen- tences in addition to simple yes-no an- swers to which the polygraph is limited. The PSE picks up stress instantaneously because the microtremor is the result of an electrical signal and does not have to wait determine the shape of the circumstances that have gotten the subject in his present fix. The success of tests such as this leads Bell to boast, “We can do 6 months worth of psychoanalysis in 10 minutes.” The psychological stress evaluator has an interestingiy ambivalent staius as both a forensic and a clinical instrument. As the’ Michigan attomey general wrote in re- sponst: to a request for clarification of the PSE siatus under Michigan's polygraph examiners law: “...a very narrow line separates the use of mechanical devices for the purpose of measuring stress and the use of such device to determine truthful- ness.” (He decided that the act did apply to the PSE in the latter case.) Forensically speaking, the PSE is in a kind of limbo. Nineteen states have laws licensing or regulating polygraph use, and presumably in those states where other instruments are not banned, forensic usc of the PSE would be decided on a case-by-case basis. One state, North Carolina, licenses PSE operators (80 hours of training is re- quired), elsewhere, a person armed with ‘nothing but a Dekior training certificate can call himself a PSE operator. The other states. including New York and California, have no laws because of strenuous opposi- tion by labor unions to legislation they think will legitimize the use of lie detectors in employment (six states now han com- pulsory preemployment polygraph testing). One individual who is determined that does the polygrapt, says Bell. “1 can alsa* register changes of siress levels wilain a single syllable. It can be used wiin more people in mofe situations because the sub- ject is free to roar: about, and intoxication “with drugs or alcohol does not, it is claimed, distort the microtremor, The academic community has not dis- played much interest in the instrument to date—Bell explains that this community is the PSE shall gain full respectability in the eyes of the law is John W. Heisse, a Bur- lington, Vermont, otolaryngologist. Heisse is the head of the International Socicty of Stress Analysts (ISSA), a fledgling organization of 200 PSE, polygraph, and voice analyzer users from the fields of law enforcement, industrial security, business, law, and health. Heisse is perhaps the PSE’s most fervia partisan. He has rerun the Kubis study, using the contract's “‘al- ternate specifications,” and claims the PSE came out with 97 percent reliability. He has used the instrument to prove thai people with laryngectomics still register muscle microtremor, he has tested the ef- fects of dozens of drugs on PSE subjects. He has a “death test” to see how anxious people are about death, and a suicide test—five questions relating to death that can be asked over the phone. If the subject shows no stress in answering, it means he is definitely preparing to kill himself. Heisse says in seven cases the test unfortunately proved correct. He has also tried the PSE with hypnotized subjects and discovered that they show no muscle microtremor— not because of stress but because they are unusually relaxed. He savs the same find- ing applies so persons who have been brainwashed. (Quick to sce an applica- tion here, Heisse went off to San Francis- co to chart Patty Hearst's tapes, but he _ won't tell what he found.) In addition to these activities, Heisse CONPEDENSEar, ‘conservelive STMOSEs Hmowile’---oui some researchers have beea fooling around with it. One has done a study proving that stage fright increases in proportion to the number of people in an audience:. another has analyzed stress among dental patients. One researcher, says Bell, has done psychological diag- noses of alcoholics using an “emoticn-pro- ducing word test.” By charting stress reac- tions to lists of words, the researcher can says he has been doing all the lie-cetecting work for the city of Burlington-—that is, until Vermont passed a law saying only po- lygraphers can do truthfulness verification work. Heisse believes this law was passed just to protect the jobs of Vermont's three polygraphers. He has raised $100,000, gathered 300 pages of evidence, and is suing the state of Vermont. The outcome af this case could set a significant prece- dent if and when PSE’s proliferate enough ja attract the atiention of other lay- makers. Meanwhile Allan Bell wants to po hock te the drawing board. “The PSE ts to stress analysis of the voice what the Mode! T is to locomotion,” he declares. More work needs to be done on waveform aniaiy- sis, on quantitative measures of mind-body interaction, and on “flesh mechanics.” The stress evaluator, he points out, is measur- ing something no one has been able to de- fine, s0 it would be nice to really pin it down, perhaps by locating the specific areca of the brain where stress originates. One of the possible “end product configurations” envisaged by Bell’s agile mind would be a prachine that supplied a continuous meter ezadout of stress levels to a psychiatrist while his patient lay chatting on the couch. Some might find this a distressing symp- tern of human willingness to defer to ma- eaines. But fortunately, unlike the atom bomb, the PSE is only as effective as he who operates it.--CONSTANCE HOLDEN we