Implication of Culture: User Roles in Information Fusion for Enhanced Situational Understanding

Information Fusion coordinates large-volume data processing machines to address user needs. Users
expect a situational picture to extend their ability of sensing events, movements, and activities. Typically, data is collected and processed for object location (e.g. target identification) and movement (e.g. tracking); however, high-level reasoning or situational understanding depends on the spatial, cultural, and political effects. In this paper, we explore opportunities where information fusion can aid in the selection and processing of the data for enhanced tacit knowledge understanding by (1) display fusion for data presentation (e.g. cultural segmentation), (2) interactive fusion to allow the user to inject a priori knowledge (e..g. cultural values), and (3) associated metrics of predictive capabilities (e.g. cultural networks). In a simple scenario for target identification with deception, cultural information impacts on situational
understanding is demonstrated using the Technology-Emotion-Culture-Knowledge (TECK) attributes of the
Observe-Orient-Decide-Act (OODA) model.