| 2006 Technology
Symposium > Social and Behavioral Sciences
Social and Behavioral Sciences
The Social and Behavioral Sciences Area Team focuses on research about
people and how they interact with each other, as relevant for national
interests. Dimensions of focus include: behavioral assessment and analysis,
shared situation awareness, information sharing within and across boundaries,
organizational change and management, and aligning enterprise stakeholders.
Several cross-cutting themes are also of concern: communication, culture,
privacy, trust, and validating models of human/social behavior.
Cultural Semiotics for Counter Insurgency Operations & Intelligence
Frank Stech, Principal Investigator
Location(s): Washington
Problem
Deployed troops, interrogation teams, document exploitation teams, and intelligence analysts encounter symbols daily. Current support tools and methods are incapable of searching for or retrieving non-literal symbols and images. Analysts need capabilities (tools and methods) to identify, collect, tag, index, categorize, and disseminate information about non-literal symbols.
Objectives
We will build a prototype socio-cultural symbol system to tag, index, search, retrieve, and aid analysis for socio-cultural intelligence and information operations support. We will adapt and extend cultural intelligence taxonomies and ontologies to include the semiotics of symbols. We will adapt the prototype for social symbol analysis of insurgency/terrorist groups; and test the prototype through an analysis exercise.
Activities
We will research cultural analyses of symbols across various disciplines (e.g., sociology, anthropology, ethnography, archaeology) and will categorize and evaluate existing technologies for symbol identification, indexing, and retrieval. We will develop a prototype software capability and will conduct an analysis experiment with the prototype.
Impact
This analysis tool will support the cultural preparation of the environment. More generally, it will provide an initial software capability for social and cultural intelligence and the analysis of culturally based indications and warning. This capability will support first-, second-, and third-phase exploitation of non-literal, non-linguistic graphic symbols in conjunction with other social and cultural intelligence, and in support of information operations.
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Modeling Phase Change Behavior
Gary Strong, Principal Investigator
Location(s): Washington and Bedford
Problem
We hypothesize that the social group is an external representation of a subset of human behavior that serves to simplify human decision-making by reliance on group influences. This project aims to better understand the dynamics of groups such as "leaderless resistance groups," which are not organizations as much as ideologies that depend on external communications such as the Internet.
Objectives
We will test a framework for modeling social group formation, recruitment, adaptation of belief upon recruitment, group competition, and group utilization of communications technology to further group objectives. Testing will start with a potentially simple domain such as the formation of an "invisible college" in scientific publication patterns and expand to resistance group recruitment.
Activities
The initial domain will be similar to group recruitment, but much simpler in terms of data collection and extraction. Data on group formation and use of electronic communications media for recruitment purposes will be acquired from other sources. The modeling framework will seek to replicate various known aspects of recruitment. Modeling results may give insight into intervention strategies.
Impact
U.S. agencies are showing increased interest in modeling of complex systems, taking a more quantitative approach to social and behavioral research. There is potential to move beyond entity-relationship models for data representation. In the war on terrorism, the target of intelligence has changed in ways that make entity-relationship models less applicable.
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Social Contexts of Enterprise Systems Engineering
Jo Ann Brooks, Principal Investigator
Location(s): Washington and Bedford
Problem
The Government programs that MITRE supports are suffering changes in requirements, cancellations, and shifting work areas. These difficulties reflect shifting interactions among powerful stakeholders who have competing interests, with no one effectively in control. While MITRE has always managed social, organizational, cultural, and political aspects of its business in tandem with the technical, these needs exceed our existing skill set.
Objectives
The objective of this research is to develop social science capabilities complementing MITRE's increasingly sophisticated technical capabilities for enterprise systems engineering (ESE). We plan to develop a database of metadata about cases of ESE, extend Renee Stevens' Mega-Systems Framework, and develop a "Roadmap" for ESE within its social contexts, through adapting results developed by MIT's Lean Aerospace Initiative (LAI).
Activities
We will generate case studies of enterprise systems engineering efforts, highlighting key participants, events, decisions, and outcomes. Data will be gathered through interviews, ethnography and workshops with MITRE site staff and interested members of sponsor organizations and contractors. During the third year, we will apply and test the value of our insights and products in field experimentation through partnering with an ESE effort.
Impact
This MSR will baseline how the discipline of ESE is currently being applied across a range of sponsor programs while it advances social science research as a complement to MITREs technical ESE efforts. The MSR will also strengthen MITRE's relationship with MIT's Engineering Systems Division and Lean Aerospace Initiative through the active participation of two MIT researchers.
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Social Intelligence: Understanding the Minds of Others
Mark Happel, Principal Investigator
Location(s): Washington
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