They used to put some disclaimer banner across the bottom about the accuracy and it being disputed. I've never been one for trusting the lie detectors.
The missus is the one for watching this shite, she'd put it on while getting ready for work, I'd switch off asap, but while it is on you end up watching. I've seen loads who you know are lying and they've failed the test, but plenty who looked genuinely shocked at the result and it will have destroyed relationships when the other person(s) just refuse to believe them.
Shit TV that won't be missed.
This is the problem with it. Or one of them, anyway. I posted something by a professor who said that if absolutely everything is done correctly and interpreted correctly the polygraph is still only 80-90% accurate. Many dispute this and have it at around 70% though. Lets just assume that it's 80% for a moment, and we realise that, potentially, two out of every ten tests done on the show come back with an incorrect result. This show has done hundreds, if not thousands of tests over the years, so the amount of inaccurate results in that time will be quite high. This means some people happily go home with a liar, a cheat or a thief because the polygraph wrongly cleared them. Or you have people going home distraught after the polygraph wrongly outs them as a cheat, a thief or a liar.
Also, we have to consider the types of people who generally go on the show. Many are vulnerable. Many are unstable and many are attention seekers. Lets face it, not many well adjusted people believe that a tabloid television show is the way to go when addressing their problems. There are so many avenues to go down that are far more healthy and far more likely to help you. Being grilled on national television wouldn't even enter my head if I were looking to address relationship or emotional issues. It's clear that most of those who go on the show are not well equipped to deal with their issues, yet the show often sets off a bomb under them and their relationships then pretty much leaves them to pick up the pieces themselves.
For me, if I thought I need a lie detector in my relationship, I'd know automatically that the relationship was not for me. If I can't trust my partner, or she can't trust me; why bother? I wouldn't need to humiliate myself on television and have my partner or I put through a polygraph. I'd already know it was over. Yet so many people go on that show and see it as, potentially, the saviour of either themselves or their relationships, but they put their trust in a test that is flawed anyway. I know the show put up a disclaimer regarding the polygraph, but it's perfectly clear that the guests who come on tend to take it as gospel, and it's these people whose lives can be turned upside down further by the result, be it accurate or not. Kyle always bangs on about how he stands by the test results when guests suggest the result was wrong, then he goads and puts pressure on them to confess. The disclaimer is there, but the host continues to push and push as though the test is always 100% correct.
As I said in an earlier post, I'm only surprised that it's taken this long before a guest killed themselves over the fall-out of going on that show. Kyle's approach is brutal, and when you are dealing with fragile, vulnerable people, that can often backfire. Sometimes tragically. In a way, the show eventually reaped what it has been sowing for so long. That is tragic, yet also inevitable at some point.
