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Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

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Terrorism is endemic to the modern world. It is impossible to board an airplane, attend a sporting event, or walk into a public building without experiencing its symptoms. However, is the incidence rate of such horrific events actually increasing? This paper draws data from The Global Terrorism Database, which collects information on terrorist events around the world (1970 through 2011), and attempts to answer this very question. This research applies G- Control Charts, most commonly used for monitoring of workplace accidents and various health care application, to determine if the time between incidences of terrorism has in fact decreased. Though not intended as a basis for policy decisions, the paper demonstrates a novel use of control charts and provides a basis for a better informed debate.
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Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing? Brandon R. Theiss, PE [email protected]
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Page 1: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

Brandon R. Theiss, [email protected]

Page 2: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

About the Data Set

• The Global Terrorism Database (GTD) is an open-source database including information on terrorist events around the world from 1970 through 2012 (with additional annual updates planned for the future). Unlike many other event databases, the GTD includes systematic data on domestic as well as transnational and international terrorist incidents that have occurred during this time period and now includes more than 113,000 cases.

http://www.start.umd.edu/gtd/

Page 3: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

How Terrorist Event Defined

• The GTD defines a terrorist attack as the threatened or actual use of illegal force and violence by a non state actor to attain a political, ‐economic, religious, or social goal through fear, coercion, or intimidation. In practice this means in order to consider an incident for inclusion in the GTD, all three of the following attributes must be present:• The incident must be intentional – the result of a conscious calculation on the

part of a perpetrator.• The incident must entail some level of violence or threat of violence including ‐

property violence, as well as violence against people.• The perpetrators of the incidents must be sub national actors. ‐ This database

does not include acts of state terrorism.

Page 4: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

A note about 1993

• The original Pinkerton Global Intelligence Services (PGIS) data, upon which the 1970-1997 GTD data are based, consisted of hard-copy index cards, which were subsequently coded electronically by START researchers. Unfortunately, the set of cards for 1993 was lost prior to PGIS handing the data over to START

Page 5: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

Limiting the Data

• Only Events that happened in the USA• Only Serious Events• At least one injury or• At least one fatality or• >$500,000 in Damage (inflation adjusted)

• Reduced to 160 observations

Page 6: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

How to make sense of this data?

Page 7: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

Industrial Engineering Approach to Analyzing Data• Control Charts- Shewhart charts are used to determine the extent of

common cause variation and identify possible points that have an assignable tool. It is a tool that allows for the critical few to be separated from the trivially many• CUSUM Chart - typically used for monitoring change detection• EWMA Chart - tracks the exponentially-weighted moving average of all prior

sample means• C- Chart - used to monitor the total number of events occurring in a given unit

of time

Page 8: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

Dec-09Dec-05Dec-01Dec-97Dec-93Dec-89Dec-85Dec-81Dec-77Dec-73Jan-70

7

6

5

4

3

2

1

0

Date

Events

Time Series Plot of Events

Events 1970- 2012

Page 9: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

2000199019801970

90

80

70

60

50

40

30

20

10

0

Decade

Count

172526

92Count of Events by Decade

Number of Events by Decade

Page 10: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

J an-10Jan-06Jan-02Jan-98Jan-94Jan-90Jan-86Jan-82Jan-78Jan-74Jan-70

80

70

60

50

40

30

20

10

0

Date

Cum

ula

tive S

um

0UCL=1.60LCL=-1.60

CUSUM Chart of Events

Does a CUSUM chart Indicate a Change?

Not very useful as the chart signals on every point!

Page 11: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

J an-10Jan-06Jan-02Jan-98Jan-94Jan-90Jan-86Jan-82Jan-78Jan-74Jan-70

3.5

3.0

2.5

2.0

1.5

1.0

0.5

0.0

Date

EWM

A

__X=0.333

UCL=0.732

LCL=-0.066

EWMA Chart of Events

What about the EWMA?

Does present a meaningful signal. However for greater than expected number of events

λ=0.2

Page 12: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

J an-10Jan-06Jan-02Jan-98Jan-94Jan-90Jan-86Jan-82Jan-78Jan-74Jan-70

7

6

5

4

3

2

1

0

Date

Sam

ple

Count

_C=0.333

UCL=2.063

LCL=0

11111

1

1

1

1

C Chart of Events

What about the C Chart?

Signals on fewer points than EWMA. Still only signals for greater number of events

Page 13: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

5/30

/200

9

11/2

7/20

00

4/12

/199

6

7/19

/198

4

9/12

/198

0

2/18

/197

8

1/24

/197

5

5/27

/197

2

11/15/

1970

5/26

/197

0

1/14

/197

0

800

700

600

500

400

300

200

100

0

Date

Elapse

d

Time Series Plot of Elapsed

Looking at the time between terrorism events (inter arrival rate)

Page 14: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

7506004503001500

60

50

40

30

20

10

0

Elapsed

Frequency

Histogram of Elapsed

Inter Arrival Rate

Has the general appearance of a Poisson or Geometric Distribution with outliers

Page 15: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

1/2/

2001

7/27

/199

6

2/22

/198

5

10/12/

1980

6/24

/197

8

3/2/19

75

8/17

/197

2

11/21/

1970

6/12

/197

0

1/14

/197

0

800

700

600

500

400

300

200

100

0

Date

Sam

ple

Count

_C=86.2UCL=114.0LCL=58.3

1

1

1

1

1

1

1

1

1111

1

1

111

1111

11

1

1

1

1

11

1

1

1

1

11

1

11

1

11

1

1

1

1

1

1

1111

1

1

111

1

1111

1

1

1

111

1

1

1

111

1

1

1

111

11

1

11111111111

11

1111

11111111111111111111111

111111

C Chart of Elapsed

C Chart of Inter Arrival Rate

Signals on the majority of points! Not very useful

Page 16: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

G Control Charts

• Developed and evaluated for the monitoring the number of cases between hospital acquired infections and other adverse health events• Also can be used to monitor the number of days between events • Used to analyze rare events• Assumes that the data follows a geometric-type distribution• Assumes that the opportunities are reasonably constant.

Page 17: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

1/2/

2001

7/27

/199

6

2/22

/198

5

10/12/

1980

6/24

/197

8

3/2/19

75

8/17

/197

2

11/21/

1970

6/12

/197

0

1/14

/197

0

800

700

600

500

400

300

200

100

0

Date

Days

Betw

een E

vents

CL=57.8

UCL=559.3

LCL=0

1

11

2

1

2222222222222222222222222

G Chart of DateEvent Probability = 0.012

G Chart of Inter Arrival Rate

Signals when there is a large number of days between events

Page 18: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

Category81

078

075

072

069

066

063

060

057

054

051

048

045

042

039

036

033

030

027

024

021

018

015

012

0906030

70

60

50

40

30

20

10

0

Valu

e

ExpectedObserved

Chart of Observed and Expected Values

360

300

240

180

720

120

810

690

660

570

540

510

270

450

420

210

390

150

3306048

09030600

630

750

780

140

120

100

80

60

40

20

0

Category

Contr

ibute

d V

alu

e

Chart of Contribution to the Chi-Square Value by Category

Chi-Square Goodness-of-Fit Test for Observed Counts in Variable: Count N DF Chi-Sq P-Value158 26 259.591 0.000

Compared to a Geometric Distribution with a probability of 0.0117232

Does the inter arrival rate follow a Geometric Distribution?

Page 19: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

2000199019801970

800

700

600

500

400

300

200

100

0

Decade

Elapse

d

202.588149.958

113.76939.7582

Boxplot of Elapsed

Is the number of days between events constant across decades?

Page 20: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

Kruskal-Wallis Test on Elapsed

Decade N Median Ave Rank Z1970 91 20.00 59.8 -6.301980 26 104.00 102.6 2.811990 24 110.00 108.1 3.332000 17 91.00 109.2 2.84Overall 158 79.5

H = 40.01 DF = 3 P = 0.000H = 40.02 DF = 3 P = 0.000 (adjusted for ties)

Is the difference statistically significant?

Page 21: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

1/2/

2001

7/27

/199

6

2/22

/198

5

10/1

2/19

80

6/24

/197

8

3/2/

1975

8/17

/197

2

11/21/

1970

6/12

/197

0

1/14

/197

0

1400

1200

1000

800

600

400

200

0

Date

Days

Betw

een E

vents

CL=27 CL=81 CL=78CL=143

UCL=268

UCL=781 UCL=753

UCL=1371

LCL=0 LCL=0 LCL=0 LCL=0

1970 1980 1990 2000

222222222222222222

G Chart of Date by DecadeEvent Probability = 0.024, 0.008, 0.009, 0.005

Dividing the arrival rate into stages by decade

Page 22: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

ObamaBush IIClintonBushReaganCarterFordNixon

70

60

50

40

30

20

10

0

President

Count

1

14

19

8

19

25

11

63

Chart of President

The Number of Events by President in Office

Page 23: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

ObamaBush IIClintonBushReaganCarterFordNixon

800

700

600

500

400

300

200

100

0

President

Elapse

d

211204.214

121.944

222.25

138.526

57.2482.181825.9516

Boxplot of Elapsed

The Inter Arrival Rate by President in Office

Page 24: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

1/2/

2001

7/27

/199

6

2/22

/198

5

10/1

2/19

80

6/24

/197

8

3/2/19

75

8/17

/197

2

11/2

1/19

70

6/12

/197

0

1/14

/197

0

1600

1400

1200

1000

800

600

400

200

0

Date

Days

Betw

een E

vents

CL=18CL=52 CL=40 CL=99CL=119 CL=74CL=159UCL=177

UCL=500UCL=386

UCL=950

UCL=1141

UCL=716

UCL=1526

LCL=0LCL=0 LCL=0 LCL=0LCL=0 LCL=0LCL=0

Ford Carter Reagan BushClinton Bush IINixon

222222222

G Chart of Date by PresidentEvent Probability = 0.037, 0.013, 0.017, ..., 0.004

Dividing the arrival rate into stages by President in Office

Page 25: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

Restricting To Only Events With Fatalities

Page 26: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

Dec-09Dec-05Dec-01Dec-97Dec-93Dec-89Dec-85Dec-81Dec-77Dec-73Jan-70

3.0

2.5

2.0

1.5

1.0

0.5

0.0

Mon-Year

Events

Time Series Plot of Events

59 events where at least one individual was killed

Fatal Events 1970- 2012

Page 27: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

J an-10J an-06J an-02J an-98J an-94J an-90J an-86J an-82J an-78J an-74J an-70

3.0

2.5

2.0

1.5

1.0

0.5

0.0

Mon-Year

Sam

ple

Count

_C=0.123

UCL=1.173

LCL=0

11

1

11

11

1

C Chart of Events

C Chart of Fatal Events by Month

Again signal that the 1970s had unusually high occurrences of terrorism

Page 28: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

12/30/

1994

6/18

/198

4

1/28

/198

2

11/2

2/19

78

12/29/

1975

7/1/19

73

10/26/

1972

4/2/19

71

6/30

/197

0

4/24

/197

0

3000

2500

2000

1500

1000

500

0

Date

Elapse

d

Time Series Plot of Elapsed

Looking at the time between fatal events (inter arrival rate)

Page 29: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

2400180012006000

35

30

25

20

15

10

5

0

Elapsed

Frequency

Histogram of Elapsed With Fatalities

Inter Arrival Rate of Fatal Events

Page 30: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

7/27

/199

6

8/7/19

87

5/4/19

82

2/15

/197

9

9/10

/197

6

10/20/

1973

12/3

1/19

72

4/29

/197

1

7/17

/197

0

4/24

/197

0

3000

2500

2000

1500

1000

500

0

Date

Sam

ple

Count

_C=233UCL=278LCL=187

1

1

111

1

1

1

1

1

11

1111

1

1111

1

1111

11111111

111111111111

C Chart of Elapsed

C Chart of Fatal Events

Signals on almost every point!

Page 31: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

7/27

/199

6

8/7/

1987

5/4/19

82

2/15

/197

9

9/10

/197

6

10/20/

1973

12/3

1/19

72

4/29

/197

1

7/17

/197

0

4/24

/197

0

3000

2500

2000

1500

1000

500

0

Date

Days

Betw

een E

vents

CL=173

UCL=1658

LCL=0

1

222

G Chart of DateEvent Probability = 0.004

G Chart of Fatal Events

Signals again that the 1970s had a high rate of events. Also signals that the ’00 had a lower rate

Page 32: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

2000199019801970

40

30

20

10

0

Decade

Count

2

8

12

37

Chart of Decade

Fatal Events by Decade

Page 33: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

7/27

/199

6

8/7/19

87

5/4/19

82

2/15

/197

9

9/10

/197

6

10/20/

1973

12/31/

1972

4/29

/197

1

7/17

/197

0

4/24

/197

0

4000

3000

2000

1000

0

Date

Days

Betw

een E

vents

CL=63 CL=177CL=397

UCL=610

UCL=1697

UCL=3791

LCL=0 LCL=0 LCL=0

1970 1980 1990

22

G Chart of Date by DecadeEvent Probability = 0.011, 0.004, 0.002

G Chart of Fatal Events by Decade

Page 34: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

ObamaBush IIClintonBushReaganCarterFordNixon

3000

2500

2000

1500

1000

500

0

President

Elapse

d2818

803

548419.5

274.444168.111

274

55.8889

Boxplot of Elapsed

Fatal Events by President in Office

Page 35: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

7/27

/199

6

8/7/19

87

5/4/19

82

2/15

/197

9

9/10

/197

6

10/20/

1973

12/31/

1972

4/29

/197

1

7/17

/197

0

4/24

/197

0

6000

5000

4000

3000

2000

1000

0

Date

Days

Betw

een E

vents

CL=40CL=412

CL=131 CL=225CL=267CL=569UCL=386

UCL=3940

UCL=1262

UCL=2150UCL=2553

UCL=5437

LCL=0LCL=0 LCL=0 LCL=0LCL=0LCL=0

Nixon FordCarter Reagan Bush Clinton

22

G Chart of Date by PresidentEvent Probability = 0.017, 0.002, 0.005, ..., 0.001

G Chart of Fatal Events by Decade

Page 36: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

Conclusion

• Social and Political Science Researchers are presented with challenges of analyzing large data sets• Industrial Engineering Tools Techniques and methods can be

effectively used to analyze these data in novel ways• Like in a traditional industrial engineering context, using and analyzing

data with the proper tool can result in better outcomes for the customer

Page 37: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

Questions?

Contact Information:Brandon R. Theiss, PE

Rutgers School of Law- [email protected]

Page 38: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

7506004503001500

48

36

24

12

0

7506004503001500

48

36

24

12

0

1970

Elapsed

Frequency

1980

1990 2000

Histogram of Elapsed

Panel variable: Decade

Page 39: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

7506004503001500

50

40

30

20

10

0

Elapsed

Frequency

Histogram of ElapsedDecade = 1970

Page 40: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

12/7/1

979

9/28

/197

8

9/10

/197

6

1/24

/197

5

2/27

/197

3

5/9/19

72

4/29

/197

1

8/24

/197

0

6/17

/197

0

5/1/19

70

1/14

/197

0

300

250

200

150

100

50

0

Date

Days

Betw

een E

vents

CL=27.2

UCL=268.0

LCL=022

222

222

22222222

22

G Chart of DateEvent Probability = 0.024

Page 41: Is the Rate of Events of Terrorism Increasing?

Category25

024

023

022

021

020

019

018

017

016

015

014

013

012

011

010

0908070605040302010

30

25

20

15

10

5

0

Valu

e

ExpectedObserved

Chart of Observed and Expected Values

240802012

022

021

06030200

100

250

1607015

013

014

017

040180

110

19090501023

0

9

8

7

6

5

4

3

2

1

0

Category

Contr

ibute

d V

alu

e

Chart of Contribution to the Chi-Square Value by Category

Chi-Square Goodness-of-Fit Test for Observed Counts in Variable: C-Obs

N DF Chi-Sq P-Value91 24 37.7535 0.037


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