Late Vertex Positivity in Event-Related Potentials as a Guilty Knowledge Indicator: A New Method of Lie Detection

Abstract

Subjects were allowed to choose an item to keep from nine items in a box. They then were shown one of nine words randomly selected on a display screen. One of these words described the chosen item, the others described novel items. The subjects were told to try not to react emotionally to any of the words, but to try to defeat this test of deception. It was found that large positive waves with latencies between 400 and 700 ms poststimulus were present in the ERPs to the chosen but not to the novel words.

Key Words:

• lie detection
• ERP
• guilry knowledge