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Modeling terror attacks: A cross-national, out-of-sample study

Ryan Bakker

Daniel W. Hill Jr.

Will H. Moore

Understanding Terrorism

ISBN: 978-1-78350-827-3, eISBN: 978-1-78350-828-0

Publication date: 21 June 2014

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this study is to assess the ability of a theoretically motivated statistical model to accurately forecast annual, national counts of terror attacks out-of-sample.

Methodology/approach

Bayesian multi-level models, classification analysis, marginal calibration plots

Findings

We find that the model forecasts reasonably well, but conclude that its overall performance suggests that it is not ready for use in policy planning. This is likely due to the coarse temporal and spatial aggregation of the data.

Research limitations/implications

The implications of this study are that social scientists should devote more effort into evaluating the predictive power of their statistical models, and that annual, national data on violent conflict are probably too coarse to provide useful information for policy planning.

Originality/value of paper

The primary value of our modeling effort is to provide a baseline against which to evaluate the performance of more region- and country-specific models to be developed in the future.

Keywords

Acknowledgements

Acknowledgments

The project upon which this chapter draws has received helpful feedback from audiences at the Centre for the Study of Civil War Working Group at Peace Research Institute, Oslo; the Departments of Political Science at Essex University, Florida State University, and University of North Texas; and the annual meetings of the International Studies Association (2010, New Orleans, LA) and Peace Science Society (2008, Claremont, CA). We appreciate comments and feedback on the project from John Ahlquist, Dave Armstrong, Jason Barabas, Bethany Barrett, Bill Berry, Halvard Buhaug, David Cunningham, Kathleen Cunningham, Scott Edwards, Mike Findley, James Forest, Scott Gates, Jeff Gill, Havard Hegre, Brian Lai, Jim Piazza, Chris Reenock, Dave Siegel, Havard Strand, and Joe Young.

Citation

Bakker, R., Hill, D.W. and Moore, W.H. (2014), "Modeling terror attacks: A cross-national, out-of-sample study", Understanding Terrorism (Contributions to Conflict Management, Peace Economics and Development, Vol. 22), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 51-68. https://doi.org/10.1108/S1572-8323(2014)0000022008

Publisher

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Emerald Group Publishing Limited