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A Model of Hostile Intent: Field Trial
Dr Peter Eachus
Dr Alex Stedmon
Professor Les Baillie
Cartagena, Colombia, November 18th-20th 2010
unclassified
Hostile Intent
Most, if not all successful terrorist operations, have involved active hostile reconnaissance, before the attack was launched.
Terrorist actions require intelligence, obtained through hostile reconnaissance.
Intelligence can be gathered via open sources, e.g. the Internet, web cams, googlemaps, streetview (Times Square bomber).
For immediate, timely intelligence, active reconnaissance will be required and it is at this time that the terrorist may be at their most vulnerable.
In the era of the suicide terrorist, detecting the terrorist at the moment they are about to carry out their threat, is too late.
Hostile Reconnaissance
CCTV film of three July 7 bombers doing a dummy run on the Tube a week before the attacks that killed 52
Towards a Model of Hostile Intent
Essentially, hostile reconnaissance will be experienced as highly stressful for the perpetrator and the purpose of this study is to determine how this stress response is manifested and what influence this might have on the behaviour of the individual concerned.
In this field study participants were placed in situations of increasing stress, designed to mimic that found during hostile reconnaissance. After establishing baseline levels of stress within a laboratory situation, participants were then asked to traverse a crowded place within the real world, namely a busy shopping mall. By requiring participants to complete an increasingly demanding task, i.e. simulating hostile intent, stress levels were manipulated and the consequences in terms of behavioural, psychological, physiological and biological status were evaluated.
Hostile Reconnaisance and Stress
It seems highly likely that those engaged in hostile reconnaissance will experience high levels of stress, perhaps more so than they do when actively engaged in a terrorist action.
Stress can manifest itself:
Psychologically.....anxiety, irritabity, depression.
Physiologically......heart rate, sweating, pupil dilation, increase in core temperature, respiration.
Biologically........... cortisol secretion (stress hormone), production of alarm, or stress pheromones.
Behaviourally........speech, paralanguage, but perhaps more gross measures of behaviour, e.g. anomalous movement or responses.
The Field TrialData Collection:
Psychological: State Trait Anxiety Inventory
Physiological: HR, Respiration, Body Temperature
Biological: Salivary Cortisol, Axillary Sweat
Behavioural: CCTV Recording
The Task
Participants were asked to traverse the given route, taking photographs at designated points “as evidence” that they had completed the traverse. They were informed that the traverse was untimed but should take about 15 minutes. Data was recorded during the traverse. Participants paid £20.
Participants (20 males) were informed that they were taking part in an experiment investigating stress and shopping.
Baseline data was collected at psychophysiological laboratory, University of Salford. Participant paid £10.
Participants then transported to nearby shopping mall known as the Trafford Centre.
This first traverse was designated Low Intent because of the relatively low levels of stress likely to be induced..
Simulation of Hostile Intent
On completion of first traverse all participants were told that they had been successful and after retrieving the psychological, physiological and biological data, they were paid £20.
Participants were now offered the opportunity to take part in a second traverse. However this time they were informed that the traverse would be timed and that they had to complete it 10% faster than their first traverse.
Inducing StressAs well as having to complete the traverse more quickly, participants were also informed that on the second traverse CCTV operators and plain clothes security staff would be looking for any unusual or obtrusive behaviour.
They were also told that two previous participants had been observed because they were almost running in an attempt to beat the deadline (this was not the case).
Finally, participants were informed that if they completed the second traverse successfully, i.e. within time, with all the target photographs, and without being observed, then they would be paid a further £70, taking their total payment for participation to £100.
However, the participants were also informed that if they were unsuccessful in the second traverse, then not only would they lose the £70, but they would also lose the £20 paid for the first traverse. This was designated the High Intent condition as it was designed to induce high levels of stress, thus simulating hostile reconnaissance.
Findings
Psychological Parameter
The psychological data was obtained using the STAI (State Trait Anxiety Inventory), a self-report measure of psychological state. High scores (max 24) indicated high levels of stress.
Increasing STAI
Baseline
8.84
Low Intent
10.78
High Intent
13.08
ANOVA
F=28.859
P<0.001
Findings
Physiological Parameters
Baseline79.35
Increasing Heart Rate
Beats/min
Low Intent109.15
High Intent134.67
ANOVAF=71.52P<0.001
Findings
Physiological Parameters
Baseline16.25
Increasing Respiration
Breaths/min
Low Intent23.89
High Intent26.97
ANOVAF=73.037P<0.001
Findings
Physiological Parameters
Baseline32.90
Increasing Temperature
Degrees C
Low Intent32.95
High Intent33.07
ANOVANot significant
Findings
Bioiological Parameters
Baseline0.021802947
Changes in Salivary Cortisol
Samples of cortisol obtained at start and end of each of three conditions.
Low Intent-0.084963158
High Intent0.305339368
Paired sample t-test for High Intent t=3.250P<0.004
Findings
Bioiological Parameters
Stress pheromone precursor detected using Gas Chromotography - Mass Spectrometry (GC-MS) .
The pattern shown was only found in the sweat of participants in High Intent condition.
34 34.5 35 35.5 36 36.5 37 37.5-1
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7x 10
4
A
B
C D
Figure 2.0: Peaks identified from GC traces as varying between reference and stressed samples. Traces for samples 2,3 and 4 are overlaid.
Findings
Behavioural Parameter
To evaluate the behavioural parameter a group of 15 volunteers was asked to watch the CCTV clips of the participants in the Low Intent and High Intent conditions. At the end of each clip they were asked to rate how “stressed” the participant appeared to be using a 10 point Likert scale, where 1 = low stress and 10 = high stress.
No significant differences were found in the ratings for the Low Intent and High Intent CCTV clips.
Conclusions
The research presented here has demonstrated that it is possible to simulate terrorist behaviour during hostile reconnaissance.
In this field trial of hostile intent the predicted changes, psychologically, physiologically and biologically have all been confirmed. The behavioural changes, if any, require further study.
It is suggested that this validation of the model will prove fruitful in further research that seeks to understand the nature of hostile intent.