A Tremor In The Blood
Lykken, a well-known polygraph expert, dismantles many myths of lie detector tests and practices and allows us to evaluate assumptions surrounding these tests, which measure variations in an individual's emotional stress. Seventeen years after the book's first edition (LJ 10/1/80), he offers a work to reflect substantial changes in truth detection technology during that period, tracing the historical and scientific background of lie detection based on different polygraph tests. Lykken critically examines many tools designed to verify the truth and finds no specific response in the scientific literature. He offers his own Guilty Knowledge Test (GKT) as based on sounder psychological principles than the dominant polygraph Control Question Test (CQT). Lykken argues that GKT has an ability to detect both guilt and innocence. Individuals interested in legal and criminal matters and social and psychological testing will welcome this book. Recommended for public libraries.?Steven Puro, St. Louis Univ.Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.