This link has been bookmarked by 45 people . It was first bookmarked on 12 Jul 2007, by Dan McCrea.
-
18 Jun 17
kevinoempty
-
19 May 08
-
12 May 08
-
12 Sep 07
-
31 Jul 07
-
16 Jul 07
-
15 Jul 07
-
13 Jul 07
-
cofiemInteresting article and link to paper about why we tend to ignore the demands made by terrorists, and assume the terrorism they cause is their ultimate goal.
-
12 Jul 07
-
Two people are sitting in a room together: an experimenter and a subject. The experimenter gets up and closes the door, and the room becomes quieter. The subject is likely to believe that the experimenter's purpose in closing the door was to make the room
via:wired psychology terrorism brain correspondentInterferenceTheory cognitiveBias motivations targetBook military civilian hezbollah tamilTigers
-
In other words, terrorism doesn't work, because it makes people less likely to acquiesce to the terrorists' demands, no matter how limited they might be. The reaction to terrorism has an effect completely opposite to what the terrorists want; people simpl
Culture Evolution Islam Strategy Psychology Politics Terrorism
-
ken .Schneier on CorrespondentInferenceTheory (we infer intention from simple observation, crash=>u-r-bad-driver) but as per Abrams study it's an ineffective convincer strategy - suffers paradoxical intention, reaction reinforces lack of influence
brain cognitive fear politics psychology statistics strategy terrorism theory
-
Jeff StewartPeople tend to infer the motives -- and also the disposition -- of someone who performs an action based on the effects of his actions, and not on external or situational factors.
correspondentinference inference terrorism iraq brain thought theory article analysis psychology unread evolution humans
-
Jeff MurphyBut like all cognitive biases, correspondent inference theory fails sometimes. And one place it fails pretty spectacularly is in our response to terrorism. Because terrorism often results in the horrific deaths of innocents, we mistakenly infer that the h
cognition government Terrorism Psychology Politics Security brain wired for:libertarianleft
-
-
theory of "correspondence" to describe the extent to which this effect predominates. When an action has a high correspondence, people tend to infer the motives of the person directly from the action: e.g., hitting someone violently. When the action has a low correspondence, people tend to not to make the assumption: e.g., moving to Seattle.
-
He lists 42 policy objectives of those groups, and found that they only achieved them 7 percent of the time.
-
The theory posited here is that terrorist groups that target civilians are unable to coerce policy change because terrorism has an extremely high correspondence. Countries believe that their civilian populations are attacked not because the terrorist group is protesting unfavorable external conditions such as territorial occupation or poverty. Rather, target countries infer the short-term consequences of terrorism -- the deaths of innocent civilians, mass fear, loss of confidence in the government to offer protection, economic contraction, and the inevitable erosion of civil liberties -- (are) the objects of the terrorist groups. In short, target countries view the negative consequences of terrorist attacks on their societies and political systems as evidence that the terrorists want them destroyed. Target countries are understandably skeptical that making concessions will placate terrorist groups believed to be motivated by these maximalist objectives.
-
In other words, terrorism doesn't work, because it makes people less likely to acquiesce to the terrorists' demands, no matter how limited they might be. The reaction to terrorism has an effect completely opposite to what the terrorists want; people simply don't believe those limited demands are the actual demands.
-
Although Bin Laden has complained that Americans have completely misunderstood the reason behind the 9/11 attacks, correspondent inference theory postulates that he's not going to convince people. Terrorism, and 9/11 in particular, has such a high correspondence that people use the effects of the attacks to infer the terrorists' motives. In other words, since Bin Laden caused the death of a couple of thousand people in the 9/11 attacks, people assume that must have been his actual goal, and he's just giving lip service to what he claims are his goals. Even Bin Laden's actual objectives are ignored as people focus on the deaths, the destruction and the economic impact.
-
None of this is meant to either excuse or justify terrorism. In fact, it does the exact opposite, by demonstrating why terrorism doesn't work as a tool of persuasion and policy change. But we’re more effective at fighting terrorism if we understand that it is a means to an end and not an end in itself; it requires us to understand the true motivations of the terrorists and not just their particular tactics. And the more our own cognitive biases cloud that understanding, the more we mischaracterize the threat and make bad security trade-offs.
-
Would you like to comment?
Join Diigo for a free account, or sign in if you are already a member.