Reflexive Control and Cognitive Vulnerability in the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election

摘要

This research seeks to uncover the mechanisms of Russian reflexive control by examining its function during 2016 US presidential elections. Security analysts and US government officials have asserted that Russia used reflexive control to influence this election; however, there is little discussion on how this technique cognitively interacted with the American public. Traditional research on reflexive control assumes that the influencer, ideally, possesses an understanding of its victim's motives and tendencies before they provide tailored information to induce an expected reaction. However, this research shows that Russia also leveraged reflexive control against the American public, not through a deep understanding of its victims, but by exploiting the American public's cognitive vulnerabilities and biases on a grand scale. Since the Russians sought a general effect of political disruption in the United States, they subsequently used a wide variety of messages against a wide target audience - or in other words, they used an "information barrage" approach. This study expands understanding of reflexive control theory by: 1) adapting John Boyd's Observe, Orient, Decide and Act (OODA) loop to show how an influencer can target a victim's cognitive vulnerabilities, and 2) illustrating how an influencer can utilize intermediaries (i.e., social media and Wikileaks) to gain reflexive control of a target.