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  3. Polygraphs, or "lie detectors", are used widely in America, including on sex offenders, but in Britain many remain skeptical. Po

Polygraphs, or "lie detectors", are used widely in America, including on sex offenders, but in Britain many remain skeptical. Po

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问题     Polygraphs, or "lie detectors", are used widely in America, including on sex offenders, but in Britain many remain skeptical. Polygraphs do not detect lies. They measure changes in physiology, such as breathing rate, sweating and blood pressure. Telling lies is often stressful and can prompt jumps in the readings. But other things—fear, embarrassment, worries about being wrongfully accused—can do the same. Enthusiasts say that polygraphs accurately detect lies 80 - 90% of the time. The British Psychological Society cites studies showing similar figures but cautions that problems in the research mean that the real rate is probably much lower. And "false positive" rates(defining a truthful person a liar)can be as high as 47% .
    Boosters of the government’s scheme say the point is that using polygraphs encourages sex offenders to reveal more information, before, during and after the test. In a 2010 -2011 pilot study offenders who took polygraph tests made more than twice as many "clinically significant exposures" — information that could prompt changes in the way they are managed—as those that did not. Many said they would not have done so without undergoing the test. Jane Wood, a psychologist at the University of Kent who co-authored the report on the pilot, says that some offenders found the tests helpful as way to convince their families they were being honest about their behaviour. Others said that the discussions prompted when they failed the test helped them better to understand the conditions of their license.
    Polygraph tests do not stand on their own, argues Don Grubin, a professor of psychiatry at Newcastle University: they should be one of a number of tools used to assess offenders. Nonetheless some remain uneasy. Those using the tests may become contented, worries Anne McAlinden of Queen’s University, Belfast, and give them excessive weight. In the government’s study, the more tests offenders took, the fewer lies were labeled. That might indicate that they became more truthful, or it might suggest that they were getting better at gaming the test.
Which of the following statements about polygraphs is true?
选项 A、They are widely used and trusted by Americans as well as the British.
B、They test psychological changes, such as fear, embarrassment and worries.
C、They are proved to be able to detect lies as accurately high as 80 -90% of the time.
D、They may not be as reliable as enthusiasts have advocated.
答案D
解析 事实细节题。本题考查测谎仪的相关信息。根据定位段第六句，热衷者称测谎仪当时的测谎准确率可高达80％～90％。第七句说英国心理学会引用的研究得出了相似的数据，但同时也告诫我们研究中的问题意味着实际成功率可能比这要低得多，由此可以推断D)“它们可能并不像热衷者所吹捧的那样可靠”为答案。A)“它们在美国和英国都被广泛使用和信任”，与定位段第一句相违背，测谎仪在美国被广泛使用，但在英国却饱受质疑，故排除；B)“它们测试心理变化，比如恐惧、尴尬和焦虑”，这是对原文的曲解，原文第三句话明确说明测谎仪测试的是生理变化，故排除；C)“它们被证实当时检测谎言的准确率可以高达80％～90％”，这是热衷者声称的数据，并且定位段最后一句话指出测谎仪的误检率可以高达47％以上，故排除。
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