MESSAGE DISSEMINATION IN SOCIAL NETWORKS FOR SUPPORT OF INFORMATION OPERATIONS PLANNING Dr. Peter Svenmarck Swedish Defence Research Agency (FOI) Box 1165 SE-58111 Linköping, Sweden
[email protected] Ms. J. N. Huibregtse TNO Human Factors P.O. Box 23 NL-3769 ZG Soesterberg, The Netherlands
[email protected] Dr. A. J. van Vliet TNO Human Factors P.O. Box 23 NL-3769 ZG Soesterberg, The Netherlands
[email protected] Dr. Dianne A. van Hemert TNO Human Factors P.O. Box 23 NL-3769 ZG Soesterberg, The Netherlands
[email protected] Mr. Mikael Lundin Swedish Defence Research Agency (FOI) SE-16490 Stockholm, Sweden
[email protected] Mr. Eric Sjöberg Swedish Defence Research Agency (FOI) SE-16490 Stockholm, Sweden
[email protected] Mr. Pjotr J. M. van Amerongen TNO Human Factors P.O. Box 23 NL-3769 ZG Soesterberg, The Netherlands
[email protected] RTO-MP-HFM-202 08 - 1 MESSAGE DISSEMINATION IN SOCIAL NETWORKS FOR SUPPORT OF INFORMATION OPERATIONS PLANNING ABSTRACT Message dissemination is often an important part of many provincial reconstruction efforts. This dissemination is affected by many factors that may only be partly known, such as the impact of the information, the social network structure, socio-cultural factors that affect the information dissemination, and at what point the information looses its news value in verbal communication. Understanding and managing how all factors that affect the message dissemination may interact pose a complex problem even for experienced Psychological Operations (PsyOps) officers. This paper therefore proposes that modelling and simulation (MoS) techniques based on epidemiological modelling can be used to cope with the complexity when planning information operations.