Research Examines Language Used to Motivate and Interrogate Terrorists

Published on: 2013/07/08 - in News

David Skillicorn, a researcher at Queen’s University, recently presented two new papers at a Seattle conference that examined the use of language as a way to understand the mental states behind it.

The online magazine Inspire was the first example Dr. Skillicorn analysed in his papers. Inspire is believed to be published by the al Qaeda terrorist group in the Arabian Peninsula, and designed to increase the spread of their propoganda and messaging. The publication is considered to be a significant influence to many high profile extremists and its contributors have been the target of U.S. drone strikes.

Along with co-author Edna Reid of the National Intelligence University, the language used by Inspire’s editors was researched in regards to the magazine’s intention to motivate “lone-wolf terror attacks”, or those that are perpetrated by individuals with no support from a group.

“The research showed that the language use was similar to mainstream Western magazines, except that the intensity of Jihadist language increased steadily until the deaths of Samir Khan and Anwar al-Awlaki (a senior talent recruiter for al-Qaeda, pictured left) in a drone strike,” said Dr. Skillicorn.

Their analysis also points out the magazine’s contradiction in that its readers are urged to become involved in activities that could lead to their dceath or imprisonment, while the editors’ contribution to their cause involves simply writing about it.

In his second paper, new research that might improve interrogation techniques was presented. It surmised that the language used by those asking the questions interacts in complex ways with respondent’s language. This makes it more difficult to determine deception from their responses alone.

Therefore an automated form of detecting deception would require it being based on both the language of the question and the resulting answer. Additionally, interrogation will need to incorporate intentionally worded questions – either being very neutral in their language (ie. “tell me what happened”), or primarily incorporate prompting words that lead to the greatest differences between true and false answers from the subject.

These findings were presented at the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers’ international conference on intelligence and security informatics in Seattle. In addition to co-author Edna Reid, Queen’s University graduate student Carolyn Lamb worked with Dr. Skillicorn on this research.

Dr. Skillicorn has discusses other aspects of interrogation and language as it relates to radicalisation on his blog.

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Photo source: Wikimedia Commons