The communicative components of a psychological / information operation

The original article: https://legascom.ru/notes/7762-the-communicative-components-of-a-psychological-information-operation .
Psychological / information operation is, first of all, communication, therefore we are interested in the types of communicative processes that most effectively serve its purposes. G. Jowett and V. O'Donnell define propaganda as manipulation of a symbolic environment, which can be without a physical environment, and with it. In the latter case, we have a variant of the influence of new communication technologies on the essence of propaganda, that is, changing the conditions for transmitting messages forms certain characteristics of the message itself. Yu also wrote on this topic. Lotman, when he was thinking about the problem of translating texts written in different cultural languages. With such recoding, there is always a fraction that cannot be translated, and it is this fraction that most successfully reproduces the essence of this type of communication channel.
An important component of a psychological operation is another audience, usually by definition it is always an audience outside their country. This is necessarily noted in the relevant definitions.
For example, "An organization for 'international communications' means an organization in one country for communication either with the world as a whole or with a separate audience in another country." Since this is a different audience, we know its language and culture less well. Sometimes, believing that we know, we get negative results due to real ignorance. For example, the field charter for psychological operations of the United States speaks about the use of the ace of spades during the Vietnam War, which is a symbol of death for Western culture. But this was a mistake, because this symbol does not have such a meaning in Eastern culture. Or such an example as leaflets that were written in imperfect Japanese, which caused smiles at the first stage of the psychological warfare of the Pacific operation. The effect of such international communications can be directed at both individual and mass consciousness. There are operations for remote influence on the leader, which allows you to achieve maximum accuracy in communication. This is made possible by a detailed knowledge of this person and his communication channels. On the other hand, mass consciousness as a special object is also subject to accurate and objective measurement. The success of psychological surgery depends on the accuracy of this study.
Within the framework of psychological operations, we will be interested in two options for information actions:
entering characteristics;
replacement of characteristics.
The types of characteristics introduced are determined by three main components of the communication process - the target audience, the key message and the communication channel. At the same time, the key communicator (or the leader of public opinion) is also, in our opinion, an element of the channel, since it is quite seriously connected with it.
Researchers identify two types of key communicators: universal, associated with all channels, and specific, associated with a specific channel.
The message must meet the personal needs of the recipient of the information. For example, during World War II, propagandists conveyed the following message to German soldiers: "Wouldn't it be better to use your courage and strength for your own life when Germany is rehabilitated after the war?" The message should also not attack, it should speak to the audience in its language, recognize the bravery and professionalism of the enemy soldiers. At the same time, one should emphasize the inevitability of one's victory and the obligatory defeat of the enemy.
When planning psychological operations, attention is paid to the choice of a communication channel through which any message can be transmitted. At the same time, even the crowd in the American field charter is considered as a variant of the channel, which is also the recipient of this message.
In the Soviet and post-Soviet space, the level of trust in the source of information is a very important parameter, since quite often official messages do not find support among the population precisely because of the low level of trust. It is in this area that an important link between the government and the population has been lost, at the same time in the United States, government public relations actively developed during the depression years, when the government had nothing but words to offer its population.
Radio was a popular means of propaganda during the Second World War (which was later duplicated during the Cold War). At that time, this was the main tool for Germany: it had a network of 26 radio stations. At the same time, foreign broadcasting was monitored to fight back against rumors. However, there is one drawback in this model: it is not possible to refer to other people's data in order not to distribute it yourself. Professor Ya. Zasursky in the program "The Third Superfluous" rightly stressed about Western propaganda in Soviet times, it told us about events inside the country, not outside it.
Such topics will always be popular if you keep quiet about them.
A message can affect the characteristics of a communication channel in different ways. One or another channel can be rebuilt according to the information it receives. For example, media coverage during the Persian Gulf War, due to the introduction of special censorship on visual messages, affected the creation of computer graphics. The same system in a new situation can build up other "muscles". One researcher on the Gulf War writes: "Anti-war critics in the media accused the television networks of trying to decorate the face of the war with the help of videography. But this criticism was not taken into account, because the essence of good television design is aimed at attracting the viewer, while hiding aspects that are repulsive. Well-made graphics are theoretically capable of raising the rating." The author's next conclusion is even more serious: "Never before has a carefully made electronic image dominated the coverage of the conflict" (P 80).
As a result, films from the Vietnam War period that showed the real conflict began to look outdated. All this once again demonstrates that the channel gives its characteristics to the message and thanks to this, the viewer sees a symbolic picture of the channel, and not real situations. The graphics came out on top due to a shortage of personnel, i.e. the very essence of the channel came into conflict with the lack of real filling, which manifested itself in solving the problem in a purely Hollywood way - with the help of animation, albeit computer.
R. Maklaurin distributed the factors of persuasion into such:
source factors;
content factors;
channel factors;
audience factors.
Prestigious sources are considered more reliable, especially for a short period. At the same time, if the audience feels that the source is trying to change public opinion, the effectiveness of the messages immediately decreases. Bringing the audience and the source closer together increases the power of persuasion.
Regarding the content of the message, E. Bettinghouse wrote that the meaning is contained not in words, but in people. R. McLaurin also talks about the meaning of the content for non-verbal action, meaning by it the support of goals by action.
From the point of view of the audience, there are messages whose persuasive power is felt or not felt by the audience.
Research in the field of psychological operations and in the field of Public Relations begins with the so-called communicative audit. As a result, an answer should appear to the question of which channel or combination of channels is desirable for this type of audience. As a result of the analysis of the audience, we can answer the question of what we are vulnerable to, what is our susceptibility to certain propaganda messages.
After conducting such a communicative audit and an appropriate analysis of the audience, you can more clearly formulate your actions and goals. Knowledge of public opinion allows us to take the next step - to try to build a national model of the world. This model makes it possible to see the positive and negative characteristics of objects.
In general, the research has the following objectives:
to identify target audiences;
motivations and views of individuals and groups of selected audience types;
analysis of vulnerability points from the point of view of psychological surgery;
determining the most effective message content;
defining communication channels;
evaluation of the effectiveness of psychological surgery programs.
Let's emphasize once again what we started with: we are talking about communication parameters. Even a detailed (cultural or ethnographic) analysis of the audience aims to build a more accurate communication flow, which as a result can help save material and intellectual resources. The choice of alternatives in all these cases is carried out only from the point of view of increasing the effectiveness of propaganda communication.
The scope of psychological operations in the modern world is not narrowing, but, on the contrary, is expanding. F. Taylor sees the following reasons for this: "Psychological operations were no longer tied to the traditional battlefield, since the global information space became such a field. They were used in low-intensity conflicts, for example, colonial and guerrilla wars, which needed high-intensity propaganda, they were used in the escalation of the conflict in Vietnam." The opposite side, for example, the IRA terrorists, attaches no less importance to their propaganda activities. In the modern world, the role and status of psychological operations are not decreasing yet, but are increasing, as the role and status of the information component of modern civilizations are increasing.
Factors for improving the efficiency of an information operation. Information operations have become an important part of military strategy today. R. Nixon already believed that a dollar invested in propaganda is more important than a dollar invested in weapons, since it starts working immediately. However, we still do not understand enough what these new opportunities for influence bring with them. The apologist of this trend in the USA is V. Schwartau declares: "Most people, and certainly most in Washington, have no idea what problematic issues should be raised in order to create a national information policy." Society (especially in countries with economies in transition) faces the task of stabilization. Among them is the creation of a new macro identity. In the CIS countries, the transition from the "Soviet man" type to new types of identity has almost stopped, including joining various voluntary associations, whereas in the USA almost 75% of the population belong to such associations, i.e. a more multi-layered and, consequently, more stable structure is being created.
The communication system is not chaotic, not random: it is constantly being rebuilt, acquiring more optimal forms. What factors influence the increase in influence?
The equivalence factor.
Countries at the post-industrial level of development are equally ready for impact through the same type of role of the information component. At the same time, countries that have not yet reached this level do not have information points of vulnerability. However, they, in turn, can influence post-industrial countries on an equal footing. As R. Pfalzgraff and R. Schultz write, "post-industrial societies are more dependent on information and will become the most vulnerable in the information war."
For example, terrorists act in the same way, for whom interaction with the media is becoming an obligatory element of strategy today.
The factor of the social environment.