Agent Based Simulation of Group Emotions Evolution and Strategy Intervention in Extreme Events

Agent based simulation method has become a prominent approach in computational modeling and analysis of public emergency management in social science research. The group emotions evolution, information diffusion, and collective behavior selection make extreme incidents studies a complex system problem, which requires new methods for incidents management and strategy evaluation. This paper studies the group emotion evolution and intervention strategy effectiveness using agent based simulation method. By employing a computational experimentation methodology, we construct the group emotion evolution as a complex system and test the effects of three strategies. In addition, the events-chain model is proposed to model the accumulation influence of the temporal successive events. Each strategy is examined through three simulation experiments, including two make-up scenarios and a real case study. We show how various strategies could impact the group emotion evolution in terms of the complex emergence and emotion accumulation influence in extreme events. This paper also provides an effective method of how to use agent-based simulation for the study of complex collective behavior evolution problem in extreme incidents, emergency, and security study domains

Trial By Jury Involving Persons Accused of Terrorism or Supporting Terrorism

This chapter explores issues in jury trials involving persons accused of committing acts of international terrorism or financially or otherwise supporting those who do or may commit such acts. The jury is a unique institution that draws upon laypersons to decide whether a person charged with a crime is guilty or innocent. Although the jury is instructed and guided by a trial judge and procedural rules shape what the jury is allowed to hear, ultimately the laypersons deliberate alone and render their verdict. A basic principle of the jury system is that at the start of trial the jurors should have open minds and regard the accused innocent until proven guilty. The chapter raises issues about jurors\u27 assumptions of innocence in the aftermath of terrorist bombings in the United States, England, Bali, Spain and elsewhere when persons are persons accused of committing acts of terrorism or indirectly supporting terrorists through financing organizations associated with terrorism. A study of a United States trial involving charges of supporting terrorism is used to illustrate the problem, but the thesis of this chapter is that the basic issues apply to trials that might be held in England, Australia, Canada or other countries with jury systems

False Rumor (Fake) and Truth News Spread During A Social Crisis

During a social crisis, the truthfulness of information becomes very important, particularly in determining if the information will spark extreme social engagement. We test a research model to examine major determinants of message spread during the 2016 Charlotte, North Carolina protests which occurred after false online rumors spread related to the shooting of Keith Lamont Scott. We hypothesize relationships between message spread (retweets) and extremity, negative emotions (sadness and fear), and social ties (reciprocal reply and location proximity), and Twitter experience. Using Poisson regression, we evaluate and compare two separate models (rumor and truth). Results of the analysis indicate that rumors and truths spread differently. More extreme messages spread less if they are truths, and fear does not relate to the spread of rumors. The results of the study provide theoretical and practical insights into the current research in the areas of information diffusion and social engagement

Trial By Jury Involving Persons Accused of Terrorism or Supporting Terrorism

This chapter explores issues in jury trials involving persons accused of committing acts of international terrorism or financially or otherwise supporting those who do or may commit such acts. The jury is a unique institution that draws upon laypersons to decide whether a person charged with a crime is guilty or innocent. Although the jury is instructed and guided by a trial judge and procedural rules shape what the jury is allowed to hear, ultimately the laypersons deliberate alone and render their verdict. A basic principle of the jury system is that at the start of trial the jurors should have open minds and regard the accused innocent until proven guilty. The chapter raises issues about jurors\u27 assumptions of innocence in the aftermath of terrorist bombings in the United States, England, Bali, Spain and elsewhere when persons are persons accused of committing acts of terrorism or indirectly supporting terrorists through financing organizations associated with terrorism. A study of a United States trial involving charges of supporting terrorism is used to illustrate the problem, but the thesis of this chapter is that the basic issues apply to trials that might be held in England, Australia, Canada or other countries with jury systems

Quantitative Research on the Evolution Stages of We-media Network Public Opinion based on a Logistic Equation

We-media network public opinion is a new force in the current social public opinion field that has an important impact on the guidance of social public opinion and social stability. Studying the periodic law of we-media network public opinion dissemination and constructing a quantitative model of we-media network public opinion dissemination stages provide the basis for guiding social public opinion and governing we-media network public opinion dissemination. Based on this, this paper explores the life cycle of we-media network public opinion evolution, analyzes the characteristics and connotations of each evolution stage, and determines the dominant indicators of we-media network public opinion evolution stages; in addition, this paper constructs a logistic quantitative model and its stage refinement model for the evolution and development of we-media network public opinion and uses MATLAB software to simulate the event of the academic fraud of the Chinese actor Zhai. This paper studies the four key points on the logistic curve of we-media network public opinion evolution and the five key intervals, analyzes the connotation of the quantified stage of each interval, and puts forward the governance strategy of we-media network public opinion events, through the simulation of initial values, growth rates and upper limits

Disinformation and Fact-Checking in Contemporary Society

Funded by the European Media and Information Fund and research project PID2022-142755OB-I00

SPECTERS OF THE UNSPEAKABLE: THE RHETORIC OF TORTURE IN GUATEMALAN LITERATURE, 1975-1985

This dissertation examines the ways in which torture was imagined and narrated in Guatemalan literature during the Internal Armed Conflict. For nearly four decades, Guatemala suffered one of the longest and most violent wars in Latin America. During that time, it is estimated that more than 100,000 people were tortured at the hands of the Guatemalan military. Torture, as suggested by Ariel Dorman, is most fundamentally “a crime committed against the imagination” (8), disrupting and often dissolving the boundaries between fact and fiction, the real and the unreal. The Introduction and Chapter One of this study explore the destabilization of this boundary by examining the historical and theoretical context for torture in Guatemala. The ubiquity and normality of torture was so terrible that, for many, it became “unspeakable”—an atrocity that defied language. Chapters Two through Four study three different literary modes of countering the state’s rhetoric of torture, probing the possibility of narrating torture despite its seemingly unsayable nature. Examining works by Rigoberta Menchú (chapter two), Marco Antonio Flores and Arturo Arias (chapter three), and Rodrigo Rey Rosa (chapter four), and aided by current theories and studies of torture, this dissertation investigates the ways in which these Guatemalan authors have sought not only to re-present torture, but also to explore and sometimes question the possibility of bearing witness to that torture in literature