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Monday 4 July 2016

Influences on threat assessment in a military context



I've had the pleasure of assisting a colleague in writing an article now published in Defense and Security Analysis (ISSN 1475-1798, E-ISSN 1475-1801):

Abstract
The anchoring effect is a well-studied subject. This article connects the effect with the rules-in-use within a military intelligence institution. Particularly the rules-in-use that dictate that an analyst takes his or hers starting point from recently conducted assessments of the specific area or threat. The threat assessment as well as the written assessment were affected. The results show that officers have an aversion to lower a previous given threat assessment. This gives that to understand risk assessment we not only need to understand the methods used, we also need to understand the institutions in which they are used. This is especially relevant for military intelligence as the assessments are conducted in an environment of high uncertainty.

Authors: Martin Bang and Hans Liwång
Department of Military Studies, Swedish Defence University, 11593, Stockholm, Sweden.