Oct. 1, 2020

The Future of Military Applications of Artificial Intelligence: A Role for Confidence-Building Measures?

As militaries around the world seek to gain a strategic edge over their adversaries by integrating artificial intelligence (AI) innovations into their arsenals, how can members of the international community effectively reduce the unforeseen risks of this technological competition?

Sept. 10, 2020

How to Forecast Armies' Will to Fight

Artis International who is supported by America's defense department, recent research was highlighted in a cover story in "The Economist" on "How to Forecast Armies' will to Fight".

Sept. 4, 2020

Minerva-funded researcher, Mia Bloom on the "Repatriation of ISIS Children"

Minerva-funded researcher, Mia Bloom’s project “Preventing the Next Generation: Mapping the Pathways of Children’s Mobilization into Violent Extremist Organizations” examines how children are recruited, deployed and ascertained whether they were radicalized in a number of different violent extremist organizations (VEOs) in Iraq and Syria, including the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), Free Syrian Army (FSA) and the People’s Protection Units (YPG Kurdish militia).

Sept. 3, 2020

Inside the Dangerous Mission to Understand What Makes Extremists Tick—and How to Change Their Minds

Artis International researchers have received funding from Minerva in their efforts to push the boundaries of social science, through everything from experimental surveys on armed forces to psychological tests on imprisoned extremists.

Aug. 28, 2020

New Owl in the Olive Tree post "Trust, Confidence, and Organizational Decisions about AI Adoption: The Impact for US Defense"

Minerva-funded researcher, Michael C. Horowitz's Owl in the Olive Tree post "Trust, Confidence, and Organizational Decisions about AI Adoption: The Impact for US Defense". Potentially rapid advances in autonomous systems and artificial intelligence (AI) raise important questions about how technology affects human behavior inside and outside the military domain. As ever, the effective adoption and use of emerging technologies is much more about people and organizations than about the technology itself.

Aug. 14, 2020

Coronavirus Misinformation is a Global Issue, But There Are Regional Differences

Minerva-funded researcher, Jacob Shapiro in collaboration with the Empirical Studies of Conflict Project and Microsoft Research began cataloguing COVID-19 misinformation to explore the evolution of specific COVID-19 narratives. Shapiro and colleagues identified a unique feature of COVID-19.

July 29, 2020

The Pandemic has Slashed Scientists’ Productivity

Dashun Wang, a Minerva-funded researcher along with nine other researchers disseminated a survey to U.S. and Europe-based researchers in mid-April and received roughly 4,5000 responses that revealed clear patterns around who is cutting back their research the most in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.

July 15, 2020

Best Practices for Supporting the Reintegration and Rehabilitation of Chidlren from Formerly ISIS-Controlled Territories

This brief contributes to this growing body of work by providing a specialized psychosocial approach based in child trauma theory and intervention research that directly addresses the multilevel needs of children returning from formerly ISIS-controlled territories.

July 10, 2020

DOD Awards Minerva Program Grants to Study Peer and Near-peer Competition and Foreign Malign Influence

The Department of Defense has awarded $6.7 million in grants to four university-based Minerva faculty teams to support research in social and behavioral science. Congress funded these awards to examine issues related to peer and near-peer competition and foreign malign influence.

July 6, 2020

Machine Learning Can Help Get COVID-19 Aid to Those Who Need it Most

Joshua Blumenstock, a Minerva-funded researcher had a conversation with government officials from the Togolese Republic in West Africa in regards to how big data machine learning might help them to identify households who have been impacted by COVID-19 in order to provide financial assistance.