Researching Influence Operation (IO) Mitigation: An HFE Step Forward

Abstract

Influence operations (IO) are coordinated efforts by an actor, individual or group, to interfere in the process of meaning-making for manipulation or corruption of public debate (e.g., Bergh, 2020), often involving dis-or misinformation spread. IOs are often employed through social media and based around political, social and/or ‘hotbutton’ issues and narratives. There is increasing study of misinformation spread and correction, but less research examines IO mitigation using human participants and controlled tests (rather than post-facto metrics). We conducted a lightly scoped literature review of IO research using social media, revealing emergent difficulties and challenges to designing and studying IO, and paths toward improving experimentation based on human factors research.