UHCL Faculty Research Briefs – March 2017

March 30, 2017 | Jim Townsend

Understanding terrorists’ operational motives

In combatting terrorism, taking a systematic “situational crime prevention” approach may thwart the action, Henda Hsu, University of Houston-Clear Lake assistant professor of Criminology, writes in an article that appears in the recently released book, “The Handbook of the Criminology of Terrorism,” published by John Wiley & Sons. In the same tome, he authored an article which discusses the efficacy of using time-series analysis as a predictor for terrorists’ future actions.

“With the increased criminological study of terrorism in recent years, situational crime prevention or SCP has emerged as a promising approach to prevent acts of terrorism,” Hsu and co-author Graeme Newman say in the article, “The Situational Approach to Terrorism.” SCP is the term criminologists use to describe strategies that are aimed at reducing the criminal opportunities that arise from routines of everyday life. 

Taking the SCP approach, understanding terrorists’ ideological motivation isn’t as crucial as understanding their immediate, operational motives – what it takes for them to complete their situational mission. In other words, interrupting bomb-makers’ supply chain, for instance, may be a better prevention strategy than trying to understand why they became bomb-makers in the first place. 

“We may say that it is the terrorist’s immediate and predominant motive (as against motivation) to reach and destroy the target,” wrote Hsu, who holds a doctor of Criminal Justice from the University at Albany, State University of New York. Newman is a colleague and distinguished teaching professor from the same university. “It is that operational knowledge, rather than the more distant context within which they operate, that is of immediate importance to the SCP approach.”  

The article, “Interrupted Time Series Analysis in the Study of Terrorism,” explores the various methodologies researchers have used to try to predict terrorists’ actions, especially in response to counterterrorism activities.

Hsu suggests that attention should be paid to interrupted time series analysis, a statistical method in which multiple, repeated observations are made at regular intervals before and after an intervention, or “interruption” in the time series. Statistical analysis may uncover trends that would not otherwise be apparent. Understanding how terrorists have adapted to prevention measures in the past can provide important clues to their future behavior.

“Given the dearth of scholarly attention paid to evaluating counterterrorism interventions, there is a need for the use of interrupted time series analysis to conduct proper assessments of manifold solutions to terrorism,” he wrote. #UHCLFacultyResearch

Six-volume encyclopedia on physical organic chemistry

Daniel Zerong Wang, program chair and professor of Chemistry at the University of Houston-Clear Lake, is editor-in-chief of the six-volume “Encyclopedia of Physical Organic Chemistry,” which will be published in April by John Wiley & Sons. The encyclopedia provides a comprehensive reference to physical organic chemistry, including the methodology and techniques. It puts the discipline into the context of modern and dynamic fields like biochemistry, materials science and molecular electronics.

“It is almost impossible to avoid the application of critical thinking, with the mindset of physical organic chemistry, to understand the mechanisms of biochemical process, the occurrences of disease and the way particular electronic devices work, just to name a few,” explained Wang.

The encyclopedia covers basic terms and theories, organic reactions and mechanisms, molecular designs and syntheses, experimental techniques and applications and future directions for the field of physical organic chemistry.

Wang’s co-editors are Uta Wille, an associate professor at the University of Melbourne, Australia, and Eusebio Juaristi, a chemistry professor at Mexico’s Center for Research and Advanced Studies of the National Polytechnic Institute. #UHCLFacultyResearch

Importance of building trust in virtual groups

University of Houston-Clear Lake Assistant Professor of Communication Brent Kice describes a classroom experiment on virtual team-building in a pedagogical article published in Discourse: The Journal of Speech Communication Association of South Dakota.

Titled “Developing a Supportive Communication Climate in Virtual Task Groups,” the article “contributes to the expanding area of computer-mediated communication with the article's end goal being the development of positive climates for virtual task groups,” he said.

Citing previous researchers, Kice points out that virtual team members have to quickly find ways to develop trust in each other in order to succeed in their tasks, without reliance on the verbal and non-verbal interactions of face-to-face teams.

Using supportive communication techniques suggested in trust theory pioneer Jack Gibb’s 1961 research into small-group dynamics, Kice’s classroom experiment was able to model successful virtual teams. These are important skills to have in today’s workplace, he says.

“Supportive communication climates lead to creative solutions, and professionals need to possess the skills to adapt supportive communication techniques for both face-to-face and virtual small task groups in order to meet a digital society’s career demands,” he wrote. #UHCLFacultyResearch