NCJ Number
225063
Journal
Forensic Examiner Volume: 16 Issue: 3 Dated: Fall 2007 Pages: 7-15
Date Published
2007
Length
9 pages
Annotation
This article presents a model of deception analysis based on the neuropsychological literature and clinical-forensic experience in both criminal and civil contexts.
Abstract
The model is presented from the perspective of a faker’s target/symptoms, response styles, and detection strategies. For the first part of the model, faker’s target and symptoms, the basic questions pertain to whether the individual has a motive for faking and the most likely targets of deception. The deceiver’s targets/symptoms pertain to distorted behavioral, emotional, cognitive, psychophysiological, and somatic problems. Response styles are behaviors exhibited by the faker in order to achieve some outcome. The assessment of response styles lies at the core of a deception analysis under the model. Response styles involve honest responding based on the perceptions of the interviewer; “faking bad” (malingering); “faking good“ (defensiveness); attempts at invalidation; mixed responding (faking good and bad); and a fluctuating, changing style within one evaluation session. Detection strategies involve the use of neurometric and psychometric testing, observation, clinical and structured interviews, and comparison to values such as base rates for the deceptive group to which the faker holds membership. The Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2 (MMPI-2) provides the neurophysiologist with valuable information about the patient’s noncognitive functioning, including behavioral, emotional, and psychiatric issues. A deception analysis could be applied to every forensic examination by integrating measures of faking good and faking bad into the battery of tests used. All forensic professionals, not only neurophysiologists and psychologists, who use evaluation findings corrected for deception would benefit from the model’s application. The proposed model lends itself to research that will ultimately lead to an empirically based theory of human deception. 70 references