Howdy, folks — Jerry Thomas here. Today I want to talk about something that is close to my heart and critically important to the communities we serve: getting the right people behind the badge. Specifically, I want to make the case for using EyeDetect and polygraph as successive hurdles in law enforcement pre-employment screening — and share a story from a national study that humbled me and a lot of my colleagues.
Why Multiple Hurdles Matter in Law Enforcement Hiring
Law enforcement is one of the most demanding, high-trust professions in existence. The people we hire carry a badge, a gun, and the authority to make decisions that affect lives. Getting that hiring decision right is not optional — it is a public safety imperative.
Successive hurdles — multiple screening stages applied sequentially — allow agencies to filter out unsuitable candidates early, efficiently, and fairly. Each stage only needs to identify a portion of disqualifying issues for the cumulative process to be highly effective. And when those stages use fundamentally different technologies measuring different physiological signals, the combined result is substantially more reliable than either tool could produce alone.
"If our goal is hiring more honest, qualified police applicants, we need to get that big panoramic view of what is coming right at us — not a narrow glimpse through a keyhole." Research confirms that unaided human judgment provides that narrow glimpse at best.
Four Reasons EyeDetect + Polygraph Work Better Together
Increased Accuracy Through Independent Measurement
Polygraph measures cardiovascular, respiratory, and electrodermal activity. EyeDetect measures ocular-motor responses and cognitive load through eye behavior. Because they tap fundamentally different physiological channels, combining them as successive hurdles produces a more complete and reliable picture of a candidate's truthfulness than either instrument alone.
Broader Detection Coverage
Some individuals respond more strongly to polygraph measures; others reveal more through ocular responses. Using both ensures that no single physiological "blind spot" allows a dishonest candidate to slip through. Each tool catches what the other might miss.
Deterrence Factor
Knowing that a hiring process includes both EyeDetect and polygraph examination sends a clear message: this agency is serious about integrity. That signal alone discourages some dishonest applicants from ever submitting an application — and that is a benefit that never shows up in accuracy statistics but is very real.
Consistency and Fairness
Applying the same successive hurdle process in the same order to every candidate ensures a fair, standardized, and legally defensible screening program. Consistency protects the agency and demonstrates institutional commitment to equal treatment of all applicants.
What a National Study Taught Me About Human Lie Detection
Now, I want to share something personal — because it shaped how I think about this issue more than any research paper ever could.
Some years back, I participated in a national study alongside trained police officers and investigators from across the country. The purpose was straightforward: determine how accurately we could identify deception through interview and observation alone — without instruments.
When the results came in, I was humbled. So were most of my colleagues. As trained investigators — people who had spent careers developing instincts for spotting dishonesty — we were correct on average 54% of the time. That is barely better than a coin flip.
My personal experience mirrors exactly what the published research shows. The landmark meta-analysis by Bond & DePaulo (2006)[1] — synthesizing results from 206 studies and over 24,000 observers — found that people achieve an average of 54% correct lie-truth judgments under real-time conditions. Critically, Honts, Thurber & Handler (2021)[2] cite this finding directly in their CQT meta-analysis, noting that law enforcement professionals charged with making credibility judgments show approximately the same accuracy as laypersons — about 54% — but with an additional lie bias, meaning they tend to judge truthful people as deceptive more often than chance would predict.
That is the honest state of human deception detection. The research is consistent, the finding is robust, and my experience in the room confirms it.
That experience did not discourage me — it motivated me. It reinforced exactly why validated, instrument-based credibility assessment tools matter so much in the hiring process. Human judgment is valuable and irreplaceable in many parts of law enforcement work. But in the specific task of detecting deception under controlled conditions, the instruments do it better. Acknowledging that is not a weakness — it is wisdom.
The Case for Both Tools in Pre-Employment
No single instrument is perfect, and no examiner should ever claim otherwise. What EyeDetect and polygraph offer together — as successive hurdles — is the best combination of independent, validated, instrument-based credibility assessment available today. The CQT polygraph alone achieves median accuracy of approximately 86% across 138 datasets per Honts, Thurber & Handler (2021)[2] — far exceeding the 54% ceiling of unaided human judgment.[1] They measure different things, they catch different patterns, and together they provide the broadest possible view of a candidate's truthfulness about their background.
For agencies serious about building trustworthy, community-centered law enforcement teams, the successive hurdle model is not a luxury. It is the standard worth striving for.
References
- Bond, C.F., & DePaulo, B.M. (2006). Accuracy of deception judgments. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 10(3), 214–234. Synthesis of 206 studies, 24,483 observers; mean accuracy 54%. Full Article →
- Honts, C.R., Thurber, S., & Handler, M. (2021). A comprehensive meta-analysis of the comparison question polygraph test. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 35(2), 411–427. 138 datasets; effect size r = .694; median accuracy 86%. Open Access PDF → | doi:10.1002/acp.3779
- Vrij, A., Mann, S., et al. (2008). Increasing cognitive load to facilitate lie detection: The benefit of recalling an event in reverse order. Law and Human Behavior, 32(3), 253–265. Overview of interpersonal deception detection research cited by Honts et al. (2021).
- Hartwig, M., & Bond, C.F. (2011). Why do lie-catchers fail? A lens model meta-analysis of human lie judgments. Psychological Bulletin, 137(4), 643–659.
- Meehl, P.E., & Rosen, A. (1955). Antecedent probability and the efficiency of psychometric signs, patterns, or cutting scores. Psychological Bulletin, 52(3), 194–216. Foundational successive hurdles research. Full PDF →
Final Thoughts
Pre-employment screening is one of the most consequential decisions a law enforcement agency makes. The officers hired today will shape public trust for years to come. Successive hurdles using EyeDetect and polygraph represent our best available tools for getting those decisions right — not because either instrument is perfect, but because together they are far better than the alternative.
We owe it to our communities to use every reliable tool at our disposal. Y'all take care now, and keep on doing the work.
If your agency is interested in implementing successive hurdle pre-employment screening using EyeDetect and polygraph in Texas, Oklahoma, or Kansas, I would be glad to discuss how the process works and what it looks like in practice.