In an era of continuous tension between maintaining both authenticity and informational skepticism, manipulation, as defined by political scientist Gregory Whitfield, is any obscured intentional attempt by one agent to cause another agent to alter their volition contrary to their original intent. Within the framework of statistics, manipulation consists of leveraging methods like information collection and dissemination to influence autonomous decision-making and into mainstream media practices. Proceeding into the decisive moments of the 2024 electoral cycle, defining and ameliorating the status quo begins with answering a few questions: what is political statistical manipulation, and how should we respond to it when exposure to mass campaigning occurs daily?
The sequence of informational manipulation emerges as different threat actors render content with indirect tactics to co-opt digital vectors. These indirect tactics, prevalent with political actors, aim to manipulate by bypassing audiences’ rational deliberations and implementing non-coercive pressure. One of the dominant statistical methodologies is “quantipulation:" using unverifiable (or hard-to-verify) data to convince an audience of a specific belief through errors such as sample amplification and factor stacking.
As illustrated above, statistical intervention in political infrastructures is a realm with high degrees of skepticism. In a society of unprecedented polarization, manipulation mitigation strategies initiate with identifying the agent’s intentions through digital literacy. Hence, our collective role to rebuild the common trust institutionalized in the CA community on a societal scope in the future becomes a moral obligation.