Behavioural Analytics: Mathematics of the Mind

TL;DR

This paper develops mathematical tools for behavioral analytics, enabling the analysis and prediction of individual and group behaviors across multiple languages and contexts, with applications in security and political analysis.

Contribution

It introduces a mathematical framework combining Bayesian networks, state estimation, and machine learning for analyzing behavioral data from diverse sources and languages.

Findings

Algorithms accurately identify extreme statements.

Detection of trends and shifts in behavior over time.

Analysis reveals correlations between expressed statements and actions.

Abstract

Behavioural analytics provides insights into individual and crowd behaviour, enabling analysis of what previously happened and predictions for how people may be likely to act in the future. In defence and security, this analysis allows organisations to achieve tactical and strategic advantage through influence campaigns, a key counterpart to physical activities. Before action can be taken, online and real-world behaviour must be analysed to determine the level of threat. Huge data volumes mean that automated processes are required to attain an accurate understanding of risk. We describe the mathematical basis of technologies to analyse quotes in multiple languages. These include a Bayesian network to understand behavioural factors, state estimation algorithms for time series analysis, and machine learning algorithms for classification. We present results from studies of quotes in English, French, and Arabic, from anti-violence campaigners, politicians, extremists, and terrorists. The algorithms correctly identify extreme statements; and analysis at individual, group, and population levels detects both trends over time and sharp changes attributed to major geopolitical events. Group analysis shows that additional population characteristics can be determined, such as polarisation over particular issues and large-scale shifts in attitude. Finally, MP voting behaviour and statements from publicly-available records are analysed to determine the level of correlation between what people say and what they do.