Extremist Ideological Influence on Terrorist Decision Frameworks
Abstract
Two cultural studies were conducted to clarify the ideological characteristics that serve as enablers for extreme action. The approach for both studies was to collect and analyze knowledge source materials from the World Wide Web. The World Wide Web is a rich source of cultural information that provides important clues as to the beliefs, attitudes and values of group members. Documents and postings from extremist and moderate sources were collected and translated. Relevant passages were then extracted and analyzed in order to elucidate the ideological characteristics within them. Human cultural researchers conducted the analysis in Study 1 and a new model of core extremist beliefs-values was constructed. In Study 2, the model was further tested by using computational text analysis methods to aid in analyzing sentiment from the web-based sources. Such methods remain at a early research phase of development, so new approaches and techniques were developed. Study 2 served both to corroborate the model of extremist beliefs-values devised in Study 1, as well as to advance the state of the art in automated sentiment analysis. The computational method for measuring cultural values in web-based resources adds another significant component to the cultural analysts toolkit.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- May 11, 2012
- Accession Number
- ADA562284
Entities
People
- Antonio Penta
- David Rababy
- Jennifer L. Smith
- Jessica L. Marcon
- Paul Smart
- Winston R. Sieck
Organizations
- Applied Research Associates (United States)